Can Commencement Have It All? B
arnard’s Class of 2016 will soon be sent off with a keynote address delivered by Anne-Marie Slaughter but not everybody is happy to part ways this way. Slaughter is certainly an accomplished and distinguished woman; she is the president and CEO of the think tank New America, the Bert G. Kerstetter ‘66 University Professor Emerita of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University, and was even the first woman to hold the position of director of policy planning for the U.S. Department of State. As if that weren’t impressive enough, she has also written numerous books and scholarly articles and has paved the way for many discussions about women and family in America. The work she is perhaps most famous for, her 2012 article in The Atlantic, “Why Women Still Can’t Have It All”, not only shaped a debate about the possibility of female equality in modern society but even became the most read article in the magazine’s history. However, there is a problem: Slaughter was not mentioned in the list of speaker nominations compiled by the senior class and is yet another white woman occupying a similar position and worldview as 2015 speaker, Samantha Power.
As a result, many students called for a change in speaker. Some protested that Barnard should be giving more time instead to underrepresented voices like that of other commencement honoree
and acclaimed African writer, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. In fact, this call became so loud that over 200 students and 47 faculty members signed a petition that prompted a response from President Debora Spar. While Spar pointed out that the keynote speaker is usually not decided entirely by student input, she also agreed to consider ways that the three other honorees at commencement would be able THE BULLETIN -
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to be heard in addition to Slaughter. But still, other students have complained that Slaughter does not offer a fresh perspective, that her perspective itself is a poor choice for the occasion. After spending four years at an institution dedicated to empowering women, some feel that having a graduation speaker who believes that women still aren’t able to “fully make it” in today’s society is a bit of a disjuncture. The keynote address is a speech likely to be remembered by the graduating class, which means that the speaker should be chosen with great care. Anne-Marie Slaughter was undoubtedly chosen this year because of her expansive accomplishments and Barnard’s confidence in her ability to give a phenomenal speech. It’s almost certain that each member of the graduating class will walk away with at least some new insights before they head off into the real world. However, how useful these insights are will crucially depend on Barnard’s ability to provide a commencement experience that manages to also acknowledge a wide variety of other perspectives and experiences. Let’s hope this happens for future commencements.
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by Jessica Tschida