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Conference promotes dialogue of women rockers
February 16, 2011
Alice Armandariz, known as Alice Bag, transformed the hardcore punk-rock music scene in Los Angeles in the late 1970s with her band The Bags. A self-described Chicana feminist, her music was aggressive, loud, and full of expression. Sabreena da Witch is a Palestinian R&B singer and educator who sings and raps in Arabic using her unique Eastern R&B and dancehall style. Her artistic expression stems from her experience with struggles for freedom and justice.
These women are very different, yet they share a common thread because their music has been created with social change in mind. From Feb. 17-18, the Women Who Rock conference, organized by the Women Who Rock Research Project and the Women Who Rock Graduate Student Collective, will highlight women, like Armandariz and Da Witch, whose art has helped to organize community for social change, locally and worldwide.
The conference will form a dialogue around female representation and access for women within music scenes. “We’re looking at women who rock across musical genres — rock, hip-hop, Afro-Peruvian — we’re really trying to shake up the idea of what is rock, and who are women that rock,” said Michelle Habell-Pallán, Associate Professor in the UW Women Studies Department, and an adjunct in the School of Music. Although women have been rocking in the music world just as long as men have, exclusion of their contributions aren’t uncommon.
Nicole Robert, a PhD student in Women Studies and co-organizer of the conference and the Women Who Rock Digital Oral History Project, found that the Northwest Passage exhibition that was displayed for a decade in Seattle’s Experience Music Project severely excluded women from its depiction of the development of the Northwest music scene. Of 441 images of musicians and fans in the exhibit, 92 percent were men. “We know that within those histories women have been doing amazing things and we’re just not hearing about it,” said Robert, “so this is a space to be heard, and to retell these histories.”
While performers are the most obvious contributors to music, there are always women behind the scenes, whether they’re the photographers, promoters, or graphic designers. The conference will focus on women across this artistic spectrum and will “help us get a fuller story of how rock functions in relationship to creative expression and social change,” said Habell-Pallán. “Women are often there in the background making things happen and not necessarily in the spotlight, but you still need their participation.”
Thursday, Feb. 17 at 5 p.m., the Women Who Rock conference will launch at the UW Department of Communication with the film festival “Making a Scene on and off Screen.” Short films will feature women who are making an impact and creating communities with music and other artistic forms of expression, like poetry.
Angelica Macklin, filmmaker, affiliate faculty in Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences at the UW Bothell, and curator of the film festival says, “Music plays a big part of it, but art and film and other expressions of communication are key in building those movements. Whether it’s to support other musicians or to support change within communities, they’re very tied together.”
On Friday, Feb. 18, the conference continues at Seattle University’s Pigott Building. Attendees can expect to participate in activities that don’t follow the traditional outline of a conference. “We knew the academic format wouldn’t necessarily capture the imagination of a non-academic audience, so we’re excited to structure the program in a series of dialogue workshop sessions,” said Habell-Pallán.
Breakout sessions, beginning at 10 a.m., will drive dialogue for the entire day. Attendees will join conversations that will give insight on topics such as how do-it-yourself (DIY) media helps to build scenes and document alternative histories, or how the music scene has helped to create communities against gendered violence.
During the conference, the Women Who Rock Digital Oral History Project will present the beginnings of what is becoming a large archive of interviews with women who have made their imprint on the music scene, locally and nationwide. Co-organizers Robert and Kim Carter Muñoz, a UW ethnomusicology PhD student, are two of the leaders of this collaboration between graduate and undergraduate students.
“It began through course works and reflections,” said Robert. “We have contact with people who have alternative histories, and we wanted to record their stories.” This month, the students intend to record up to 25 interviews. These interviews will soon be made available for the public with the help of UW Libraries Digital Initiatives.
Guests of the conference can also expect to enjoy performances from morning to night. Musicians and artists such as DJ Lady Jane, Christa Bell, and Maria Elena Gaitan, also known as Chola von Cello, will share their talents. To close, conference attendees can watch open-mike performances and participate in music, singing and dancing with the Seattle Fandango Project.
The co-organizers of the Women Who Rock Project hope to take what is learned from this conference and craft an agenda for where the project will go in the future. The Women Who Rock Student Collective will support the future activities of the conference and the digital oral history project. Students will lead writing groups and retreats, bring in new artists and speakers, and continue the conversation on what constitutes women who rock. Habell-Pallán said, “We’re working to bridge the work we do here at UW and connecting to communities outside with a common interest in music and rock.”
Gretta Harley on Home Alive! from Kim Munoz on Vimeo.
