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Tuesday, March 26, 2024

Interdisciplinary endeavors of feminist research

MICHELLE GORE / AGGIE

UC Davis Feminist Research Institute calls for seed grant proposals

The Feminist Research Institute defines feminist research as inclusive, intersectional, justice-oriented and transformative. The Institute promotes these values through the promotion of deeply collaborative research.

We are invested in growing the depth and breadth of feminist research at UC Davis,” said Sarah Rebolloso McCullough, the associate director of the Feminist Research Institute. “We want people to see UC Davis as a leader in feminist research. Our goal is to make UC Davis a place that is proactively trying to undo systems of gender and racial oppression, rather than just being reactive.”

To this end, the Institute is providing seed grants to selected UC Davis faculty to continue to encourage collaborative projects that apply feminist approaches to interdisciplinary research.

The seed grants are great opportunities for cross-disciplinary teams interested in research questions and their social and ethical impacts in the world,” said Amanda Modell, a graduate student researcher at the Institute. “If professors want to pilot an idea and aren’t sure that it would get support from a traditional research institute because of how it grapples with its social context and inequalities, the seed grant is for them. And more broadly, the seed grants have the capacity to catalyze interdisciplinary research that works toward a more just world, so in the world I’d like to live in, everyone would apply for them.”

Projects that received funding have included research done by Jessica Moret on the correlation between race, class, power and post-sexual assault treatment, specifically whether it was offered, accepted and completed. Research by Claire Napawan and Sahoko Yui is also underway and focuses on linking traditional domestic practices associated with women to cultural practices, food waste management and community sustainability.

If you look at our past grantees, you will see that feminist research is as diverse as any other area of interdisciplinary research, with the added benefit of the potential for transformative social/cultural impact,” said Kalindi Vora, the director of the Institute at UC Davis. “By encouraging new collaborations, FRI seed grantees find novel approaches and innovations that inspire future collaborations and grant applications, as well as energizing new cross-campus research connections.”

This Institute shows the importance of understanding how knowledge is gained.

Feminist research is not just about gender, it’s about the way that knowledge is produced and the impact it has in the world,” Modell said. “So even if you think your project has nothing to do with gender, race, ethnicity, or social class, it can still benefit from a feminist approach.”

 

 

Written by: Kriti Varghese — science@theaggie.org

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