Beginnings
are not unique on an academic campus. They occur each year as our students arrive
and enliven the campus with freshness and excitement. In late August at Emory,
the arrival of a new academic year is always accompanied by the splendor of
the flowers and trees that surround our space and bring our campus new colors
each day.Here at the Women’s Center, the start of this academic year marks the beginning of our second decade. It offers the comfort that comes from the many alliances we have made and the promise of new friends who will join our community of women at Emory.
Although we did not plan this first issue of our second decade around a particular theme, two recurring motifs struck me when reading the shared reflections and articles: one was beginnings; the other was connection. Both require an enormous amount of courage—the former for the pluckiness it takes to face the unfamiliar or deal with challenges, the latter for our sense of vulnerability as we develop new and deeper relationships.
The people whose essays appear here are indeed lionhearted. Some are survivors; others are adventurers. Their voices, like others we have heard in the past ten years, reach across the divides of race, gender, age, and class. We will bring you still more voices in the next decade. This is just the beginning.