New Feminist Activism: A Panel Discussion with Mia Herndon, Ai-jen Poo, and Rinku Sen

BCRW has long been interested in supporting social justice movements that reach beyond the limits of traditional feminist activism. In past semesters, we have hosted programs that have taken up a variety of intersectional projects that join feminist activism and analysis with other progressive movements, including reproductive justice, workplace rights across the economic spectrum, and the links between sexual and economic justice, to name a few. This panel on New Feminist Activism will explore how young feminist activists are engaging with struggles for justice in areas such as education, the environment, and race and class. By using new forms of media and building alliances, these activists (and many others like them) are creating a strand of feminist activism that is fundamentally concerned with social justice and social change. Panelists include: Mia Herndon, Executive Director of the Third Wave Foundation, a feminist, activist foundation that works nationally to support young women and transgender youth; Ai-jen Poo, Lead Organizer at Domestic Workers United, an organization working for fair labor standards for nannies, housekeepers, and other domestic workers in New York; and Rinku Sen, President and Executive Director of the Applied Research Center, a racial justice think tank and home for media and activism, publisher of Color Lines magazine, and the author of Stir It Up: Lessons in Community Organizing and The Accidental American: Immigration and Citizenship in the Age of Globalization.