Doris didn't mind being called by her first name. However, on one occasion a male colleague introduced a group of professors by saying, "This is Dr. So-and-So and this is Dr. So-and-So." When he got to Doris he simply introduced her as Doris Cottam instead of Dr. Cottam. She felt slighted and accused him of neglecting to introduce her properly because she was a woman and he of course denied any wrongdoing.
Doris readily admitted to being a feminist. She believed in equal pay for equal work. She detested the idea that women be expected to be content being kept "barefoot and pregnant." But, that didn't mean she didn't like men.
"Some people say I hate men. That's not true! I love men! In fact, if you know of any eligible men you'd like to introduce me to please do so," she told us in one class.
She didn't mind being called opinionated either.
"Some people say I'm opinionated. You're darn right I am! I've worked long and hard to cultivate these opinions. There's nothing wrong with having an opinion!"
The first class I had with Doris was Introduction to Sociology (Sociology 101). She had us all experiment with breaking societal norms. A couple of my female classmates attended a church and held hands and acted very affectionate suggesting they were a gay couple. They got a lot of looks and stares. Today, two women or men holding hands might not be noteworthy at all.
I suppose I could break a norm now by wearing a confederate flag tee shirt and a red Donald Trump MAGA hat and see how many people verbally attack me and threaten me bodily harm.
She held a contest one day in class. The contest involved three males vying for the title of Sociology Queen. No gay jokes please. The idea was that she wanted the males to act in a stereotypical feminine way. I was one of the contestants.
The three of us stepped outside the door before making an entrance. I came waltzing in trying to act like a beauty queen. When I reached the center of the room I slowly turned around so the class could get a good look at my backside and then turned to face them again with a big smile. That got a lot of laughs. The other two guys just walked in and didn't really play the part which disappointed Doris who was simply trying to teach us something about gender stereotypes. So, I was Sociology Queen in the fall of 1986. Top that.
I had other classes with Doris like Person and Society, American Minorities, and Marriage and Family.
Doris liked to use personal anecdotes to get her message across. She readily admitted her father was a bigot. He had a name for every ethnic group. African Americans were the N-word. Mexicans were spics. Jews were kikes. Italians were wops. I can only imagine what he called Asians.
Her husband had left her for some young, blond thing. She admitted to us that she begged and pleaded with him not to go through with it. But, he couldn't be swayed. When they divorced she ended up being hospitalized for depression. She couldn't stand to sleep under the covers of the bed they'd shared. She would lay down on the bed and put a blanket or Afghan over herself and tell herself she was just napping. Somehow that made it okay.
Eventually she picked herself up and returned to college pursuing her dream of being a teacher.
Although she was a feminist and concerned about equality and barriers women faced like the so-called glass ceiling, she was concerned about men as well. She was concerned about the pressures that men felt to be strong and never show their emotions and to be the breadwinner.
Anthony disagreed with her and thought that's the way things should be. A man had to be a man.
"Well, Anthony, I'm afraid the stress you're putting on yourself is going to give you a heart attack one day," she said sadly.
If Doris were still around she might be one of the few people to acknowledge the plight of men in contemporary America. Why has suicide in men increased dramatically? Why are men's testosterone and sperm counts plummeting? Why is it that considerably more women go to and graduate from college? Women now decisively outnumber men in graduate school as well. Why is that? What is happening to American men? Yes, Doris was a feminist and was concerned about the so-called patriarchy but she cared about boys and men too.
I don't recall global warming/climate change being a hot topic when I was in college although the terms were in use. We were more concerned about the ozone layer and chlorofluorocarbons I suppose. I don't recall anyone being concerned that the polar ice caps might melt or that life on Earth was in imminent danger.
What was Doris concerned about? Diapers. That's right. Doris was concerned about the number of disposable diapers filling up our landfills. Diapers that take 500 years to decompose. Doris was concerned about pollution. I think young people today are so concerned about life on Earth ending in the near future because of climate change they don't think that much about regular old pollution anymore. What would Doris have to say about climate change? As hip as Doris was I think even she would have some doubts about the so-called Green New Deal.
Doris taught me the word androgyny. She wanted us to consider the role that socialization played in shaping how we viewed gender roles.
One day around the holiday season Doris's granddaughter said, "Grandma, we have to buy a Christmas present for a boy because we're having a gift exchange at school and I got a boy's name."
Doris replied, "Why do we have to get a boy gift? Why can't we get a gift that a boy or girl could enjoy? Who decides what is a boy gift or a girl gift?"
The granddaughter was used to this sort of talk from her grandmother and said, "Well, Grandma, you know that and I know that but they don't know that."
They bought a boy gift.
Doris was hip to androgyny. But, would she surprised to hear a person can choose any number of genders now? Would she be okay with an anatomical boy being in a girls restroom because he believed he was trapped in the wrong body?
Doris was tolerant of gay people. Would she be happy about gay marriage? Would she be cool with the acronym LGBT or even LGBTQIA? Or, would she think things had gone a wee too far?
She was tolerant of transgender people as well. But, would she think a student requesting to be referred to as "they" instead of he or she was going a bit too far? What would she think of the fuss over pronouns?
What would Doris think of the #MeToo movement? We spoke in her classes of sexual harassment and sexual assault and the objectification of women. But, would she put wolf-whistling and cat-calling under the same umbrella as sexual assault?
Doris told us that sometimes in old movies a female would be acting hysterical and a man would slap her to bring her to her senses. Doris said, "By God, if a man ever slapped me he'd rue the day!"
And yet, Doris said when a man in a movie lit two cigarettes in his mouth and then gave one to his lady friend it was romantic as hell.
One day I told Doris that my girlfriend had dumped me because her parents didn't want her marrying some "farm boy." Doris found this interesting from a sociological point of view. She even mentioned it in class one day saying that she'd recently spoken with a young man who had been the victim of class discrimination.
When I was talking to her that day though she wasn't being the professor. She was simply being a friend and told me, "Well, Tharin, it's true what they say. There's plenty of fish in the sea. Forget about her. You can do better."
I wonder what Doris would think of college kids demanding free tuition and other things? Sure, she was a liberal and no doubt despised inequality. On the other hand, she had lived through an abusive father, World War II, and a divorce. She came from humble beginnings and worked hard all her life. But, she also acknowledged that certain institutions and policies had helped her along the way. Perhaps she'd tell some of these so-called snowflakes to develop some backbone and grow the hell up. Then again, she might admire their spunk and activism.
Doris was voted Professor of the Year in 1991. She retired a few years later. Doris also ran for a seat in the Iowa House of Representatives. I don't believe she won. Too bad. She would have enjoyed shaking things up.
Doris passed away in 2006. She was a woman of faith. If she's in heaven perhaps she has a glass of champagne in one hand and a cigarette in the other and is giving God an earful whether he/she/they wants it or not.
No comments:
Post a Comment