Senior Emma Maniere receives the 2015 Feminist Practice Award
The Department of Women’s and Gender Studies is absolutely thrilled to announce that WGS graduating senior Emma Maniere is the 2015 recipient of the Feminist Practice Award, an honor that recognizes Women’s and Gender Studies undergraduate majors or minors in LGBTQ Studies; Gender, Race, and Nation; or Gender and Health whose work in community service or social action best exemplifies application of feminist thought to practice. As a double major in Women’s and Gender Studies and Political Science, co-president of Students for Choice, and a dedicated researcher and instructor of urgent reproductive issues in academic and activist spheres, Emma’s feminist practice animates the necessary relationship between theoretical knowledge and social change. Over the last four years, her contributions to illuminating and realizing the imperatives of reproductive justice in our communities have highlighted the false distinction between what feminists think and what feminists do. From her analyses of eugenic sterilization data sets, to her extended critical engagement with the “false dichotomization of abortion and motherhood,” to her honors thesis on the history of abortion debates in Michigan, to her dedicated expansion – in so many spheres -- of the discourse on reproductive choice toward the intersectional realms of reproductive justice, Emma Maniere is a model of the best aims and achievements of feminist practice. We thank her and honor her dedication to our communities, and we celebrate her inspiration. Indeed, thank you, Emma!