Women's, Gender, and Sexualities Studies Awards
Berenice A. Carroll Memorial Feminism, Peace, and Social Justice Award
Award Guidelines, 2024
Berenice A. Carroll was a professor of Political Science and Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies Program at Purdue University and a professor emerita of Political Science at the University of Illinois, Urbana- Champaign. Berenice Carroll's main fields of interest were peace research, political theory, and feminist politics. She served as President of the National Women’s Studies Association and on the editorial board of the National Women’s Studies Association Journal. She was co-editor of The Political and Social Thought of Women: An Anthology (Bloomington : Indiana University Press, 2000). She also had numerous publications on topics relating to women, non-violence, and power. In addition she had over one hundred appearances as lecturer or presenter, chair or discussant, at professional conferences, workshops and symposia, universities, radio and television interviews in the United States and abroad. In addition to her impressive scholarly accomplishments, her commitment to Feminism, Peace and Social Justice is of particular import to those of us here today as Berenice was instrumental in the creation of women’s studies program at Purdue and served as Director of the Women’s Studies program between 1990-2000. She continued her social justice work through her efforts with the Lafayette Area Peace Coalition and Historians Against War.
The impetus for the Berenice A. Carroll Feminism, Peace, and Social Justice Award came from a symposium in November 2007 at Purdue University held in honor of Berenice. The Award is intended to foster and recognize contributions to scholarship and activism that are related to engagement with feminist studies, peace studies, and other social justice issues. They aim to honor Professor Carroll’s contributions to teaching, scholarship, and activism including anti-war, feminist, pro-ERA, anti-sweatshop activism, to name a few, by recognizing those students involved in feminist or social justice work—be it purely academic, purely activist, or a mixture of both.
2022 Winners
Graduate
Ariel Smith - was recognized for the project "Help Patrick Keep Truckin"
Ozgun Basmaz - was recognized for the project, "Century of Struggle: Middle East Women's Voices on Anti-imperialism, Anti-militarism, and Feminism (1922-2022)”
Monica Wolfe - was given honorable mention for the project “Imagined Postcolonial Eco-Futures in Indigenous Film and New Media”
Undergraduate
Danial Dzulkifli - was recognized for the project "Religious Feminism - The Reconciliation of 'Oppositional' Idealogies through Transnational Feminist Frameworks”
2021 Winners
Graduate
Tiwaladeoluwa Adekunle - was recognized for the project "The PMS Project: Exploring Communication's Role in Social Constructs Around Menstrual Health of Women"
Amber Lusvardi - was recognized for the project "The End of Child Bride: Social Movements and Strategic Action on Underage Marriage”
Roseline Adebimpe Adewuyi - was recognized for the project “Breaking Gender Stereotypes and Reimaging the Woman”
Undergraduate
Urvi Gupta - was given honorable mention for her project Injustice within The Odyssey”
2020 Winners
Graduate
Meghana Rawat - was recognized for the project “Shea Moisture’s Crisis: A Case Study of Racialized Organizational Identity and Identification”
Undergraduate (tied winners)
Claire Glenn - was recognized for the project "Take Back the Night"
Claire LeMonnier - was recognized for the project "IFSA Internship Reflection and Review: How Time as a Resource Impacts Gender Inequality"
2019 Winners
Graduate
Kadari Taylor Watson - was recognized for the project "Afr"ican Prints as Voice, Visibility, and Community: A Comparative Study of Ghanaian and African American Women in the 21st Century"
Undergraduate
Rachel Baker - was recognized for the project "Janelle Monáe’s “Dirty” Depiction of Afrofuturism"
2018 Winners
Graduate
First Place: Ingrid Carolina Ramon Parra - was recognized for the project "Mẽnire Making Movies: Participatory Video Production with Indigenous Women in the Brazilian Amazon."
Honorable Mention: Bianca Batti - for the project "Disrupting Video Game Culture: The Importance of Intersectional Approaches for Feminist Game Studies."
Undergraduate
Jory Goff - was recognized for the project "19th Century Medical Regulation of Hermaphroditism & Gender Variance."
2017 Winners
Graduate
Heather Murton - was recognized for pedagogical project of celebrating sex-positivity as a mode of feminist praxis. She argues for the inclusion of sex-positive discourse as well as lessons about consent in sex education programs
Undergraduate
Jesse Bohlin - examined the Virginia Kelley Archives, Exponent archives, and engaged in oral histories to uncover the history of LGBTQ people at Purdue and the change they enacted at an institutional level.
2015 Winners
Graduate
First Place: Esther Teixeira and Sandra Usuga,
“Sandra Cisneros Latinas I Tell You My Story Project”
Honorable Mention: Jaime Hough,
“Introduction to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Studies Class Fair”
Undergraduate
First Place: Dana Smith,
“Sexual Violence Prevention Summit”
Honorable Mention:
Yuhan Huang, “Building Home: Asian and Asian American Resource and Cultural Center”
L'eica Frederick, "The End to Gender Violence: A Grassroots Movement"
2014 Winners
Graduate
First Place: Aiden Powell, “Advocating for Transgender-Inclusive Health Insurance at Purdue”
Honorable Mention: Jaime Hough, “Introduction to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Studies Class Fair”
Honorable Mention: Kera Lovell, “Girls are equal too: High School Activism and the 2nd wave feminist movement”
Undergraduate
First Place: Brittany Hemphill, “Boilers OUT Loud! Performance in October 2013”
Honorable Mention: Tiffany Gavros, “Reconciling work and family: Policy initiatives for the United States”
The Carolyn C. Perrucci Undergraduate Achievement Award
Professor Carolyn C. Perrucci
Department of Sociology
Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies Affiliated Faculty member
Women’s Studies Chair 1980-81; Co-Chair 1986-1988
The award is named after Carolyn Perrucci, professor of Sociology and Women’s Studies affiliated faculty who has been involved with the program since its inception.
Every other year Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies program offers an award to a graduating WGSS major with a high Grade Point Average who also has been involved in progressive campus co-curricular activities, especially in feminist programming, and activism, thus realizing feminism’s foundational concepts of feminist theory and practice.
PRIZE: $250
Deadline to apply is March 8, 2023 by 4:00 PM
To apply: Submit an essay of one to two pages describing how feminist concepts have informed or inspired your political or community activism, and the ways in which your activism reflects what you have learned in women’s, gender, and sexuality studies. Include a transcript and a brief cover letter. Submit materials to Terry Bean, wgss@purdue.edu. Deadline is March 8, 2023, by 4:00 PM. The prize will be awarded at the WGSS awards ceremony later in the spring.
2022 Sociology Winner - Sophie Ritz
2021 WGSS Winner - Allison Reed
2020 Sociology Winner - Hadley E. Brouhard
2019 WGSS Winner - Hanya Malik
2018 Sociology Winner - Michelle Manzo
2015 WGSS Winner - Jima Fahnbulleh
2013-2014 Sociology Winner - Savanah Koob and Cody Wilson
The Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Outstanding Senior Award
Outstanding seniors are nominated by WGSS faculty for this annual award.
2022 Winner
Danial Dzulkifli
2021 Winner
Alex Griffin-Little
2020 Winner
Lauren Bellamy
2019 Winner
Hope Kelham
2018 Winner
Jesse Bohlin
2017 Winner
Emily Tiede is a Women’s Studies Major with minors in sociology, organizational leadership supervision and LGBT Studies. Emily received nominations for the Outstanding Senior Award from WGSS faculty and faulty associates based on her tremendous involvement with the program. For example, Lowell Kane noted, “Her Participation in the study abroad was stellar, and her leadership and service at Purdue goes above and beyond most students I know.”
2015 Winner
Kelsey Froelich
- Kelsey Froehlich is a third year student double majoring in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and English. “As a result of taking WGSS classes, I have a new perspective on the world and my future career, one that involves working directly to eradicate violence and human trafficking.”
Kelsey traveled to Africa last summer as a member of the WGSS in Uganda study abroad/service learning program. This picture of her was taken on the volatile border between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, where Kelsey worked with the Center for Women in Governance (CEWIGO) to gather data on violence, rape, education, and female representation in government for the United Nations. While in Kampala, she also interned for Raising Voices, a grass-roots organization devoted to combating domestic violence against women and children.
Back at the Purdue campus, Kelsey is a member of Generation: Justice and is applying her new international feminist perspective on violence as well as her growing expertise in the field of Women’s, Gender, & Sexuality Studies to collective efforts to end human trafficking and modern day slavery. Some of these efforts have her going into the community to talk with students younger than herself:
“It was frustrating to me that I wasn't aware of such crimes in the US and internationally until I got to take WGSS courses in college, so I hope to be able to go into schools and talk to students who are in high school or middle school so that they can become aware at an earlier age than I was when I was first introduced to the issue.”
2014 Winner
Tiffany Gavros
-Tiffany Gavros was selected for the Outstanding Senior Award because of her unrelenting pursuit of social justice and academic excellence. In addition to serving as the president of the Feminist Action Coalition for Today, she participated in the inaugural Women's Studies in Uganda study abroad program. While there, she successfully completed a three-week internship with Action for Development, a feminist organization that promotes women's leadership. In recognition of Tiffany's outstanding leadership potential, she was selected for the highly competitive "Teach for America Program and will begin that adventure in the fall".
The Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Undergraduate Leadership Award
The WGSS Undergraduate Leadership Award is determined by the WGSS faculty. In 2015, they were so impressed and pleased with the student leaders contribution to our community that they decided to recognize three student for their feminist contributions to Purdue University and the wider community.
2022 Winner
Casey Nutt
2021 Winner
Quinn Houlihan
2018 Winner
Elizabeth Ply
2015 Winners
The winners of the 2015 WGSS Undergraduate Leadershiip Award are Dana Smith, Jamilyn Lemish and Emily Fogle. Congratulations to all of you and thank you!
2014 Winner
Stephanie Scott
Stephanie Scott was selected for the Undergraduate Leadership Award because of her deep commitment to feminist activism. She is an active member of the Feminist Action Coalition for Today and has participated in numerous social justice campaigns on campus. This summer she will be interning at the Center for Women in Governance as part of the Women's Studies in Uganda Program.
2018 Awards Ceremony
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2015 Celebration of Excellence in Diversity Scholarship Ceremony
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2014 WGSS Awards and Conferral Ceremony
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