Imagining the Future, Clem
In the future, it is my hope that women and other marginalized groups’ voices will be freely expressed, uplifted, and respected in all spaces. However, I think that because of Saint Mary’s College’s strong history of centering women’s voices, we have a special obligation in facilitating a more equitable public dialogue in which all voices are heard. In the next century, I hope that Saint Mary’s College will become an institution that is known for the way it advances marginalized voices, both of students and of community members. This involves offering more programming to support the creative, social, economic, and political empowerment of women and other marginalized groups at all stages of life. In "Revere and Revise," President Katie Conboy’s vision for Saint Mary’s College in 2030, she writes that the Saint Mary’s of the future will be “recognized for national leadership in empowering, enriching, and advancing women at all stages of life.” I hope that, in 2123, this statement will still be a guiding principle for Saint Mary’s mission. Practically, I think that this vision statement will involve offering programming to train adult women in professional skill sets, classes on financial literacy and encouragement to invest in women founders, virtual and in-person academic programs to empower young girls to pursue their interests, and programs to encourage women and girls to write about all aspects of their experiences with strong infrastructure to publish, promote, and preserve these works.
As an artist, I am particularly interested in the promotion and preservation of women’s creative voices and artistic expression. I believe that cultivating spaces in which art can fearlessly be created and in which that art is generously shared with the broader community is the most generative way that Saint Mary’s College can promote the empowerment of women in the future. I am reminded of the following quotation from Viet Thanh Nguyen in his book Nothing Ever Dies- “sometimes art, simply by being art, by calling us into a relationship with it, is the template for reflective, contemplative, meditative thinking and feeling that might allow us to become citizens of the imagination” (286). I think this quotation affirms the value of digital humanities work that preserves art, allowing present and future generations to be called into “relationship” with that art and imagine a better future. However, I found that the art we encountered in, for instance, the 1971 Chimes and in the volume of Chimes published in 2023 represent a very limited range of women’s voices as there are a limited number of contributors in each volume. In 2123, I hope that the Chimes and other arts platforms at Saint Mary’s Colleges will represent a much wider range of women’s voices. I hope that all students will be encouraged to pursue creative expressions, going beyond the “Creative and Performing Arts” Sophia requirement and reaching a place where they are comfortable publishing or performing their own creative representation of their personal experiences and perspectives, through art forms including creative writing, visual arts, music, dance, theater, and new or hybrid art forms. Students' artistic expressions will be highly valued by the institution, distributed widely through digital media, and preserved for future generations to enjoy and enter into “relationship” with. I hope that Saint Mary’s College will also offer opportunities for non-student community members to learn, practice, perform, and publish their creative work through free community art classes and performances and that a second student-run literary magazine is founded that is focused on highlighting marginalized voices from outside the Saint Mary’s community.
Finally, it is my hope that by 2123, the culture both within and outside of academia will have evolved to have a greater appreciation for the arts and humanities and the avenues for imaginative and generative thinking that they provide. Currently, we live at a time in which disciplines such as STEM with objective, tangible results are often valued above the arts and humanities. While STEM fields are incredibly important, the work of this class shows that the humanities are equally valuable to society and present a unique opportunity for innovation and creative thinking. By continuing to rediscover, preserve, and create works of art, it is my hope that a century from now our culture will see the immense value in this discipline and cultivate a world in which all people’s voices can be freely expressed.
Katie Clem
Psychology Major, with minors in Creative Writing, Justice Studies, and Religious Studies