Molina-Guzmán participates in White House conference

On Friday, November 13, Associate Professor Isabel Molina-Guzmán participated in the joint Anna Julia Cooper Center and White House Conference “Advancing Equity for Women & Girls of Color: A Research Agenda for the Next Decade.” She served on the panel “Images and Representations” assessing the existing state of media representations of marginalized women, the extant research on the topic, affirmative progress that has been made, and the new questions that need to be addressed.

Molina-Guzmán was the only media scholar participating in the conference and said the other panelists - which included Michelle Herrera Mulligan, Cosmo for Latinas editor in chief, and Jeanine Liburd, BET executive vice president for corporate communications and public affairs - were very interested in research on media content and its effect on women of color. “It was an intense experience,” Molina-Guzmán said. “The issues discussed are central to achieving equity for all women.”

A wide variety of White House offices were represented at the event as well as a number of academic institutions involved in the Collaborative to Advance Equity through Research. Other issues discussed included the wage gap, the wealth gap, discriminatory housing practices, language discrimination, citizenship issues and the impact of policing in schools.

A fact sheet on the conference, released by the White House, outlines initial steps to address the issues at hand. It also announces funding for initiatives and additional research working groups and project, which is being spearheaded by the Anna Julia Cooper Center at Wake Forest University.

Molina-Guzmán will continue to be involved through research working groups being set up by Anna Julia Cooper Center at Wake Forest. The next step for the initiative is setting up an executive committee.;