The Feminization of Poverty: 11th Annual Conference on Womenis and Gender Studies and Feminist Theories, Tel Aviv University

The Eleventh Annual Conference on Women’s and Gender Studies and Feminist Theories, held in February 2003 at Tel Aviv University, had as its topic “The Feminization of Poverty.” True to feminist insistence on the connection between academic research and social activism, the participants consisted of academics and activists alike, women and men from across disciplines and social strata, who gathered for three days in 28 sessions and panels to discuss, debate, and testify about poverty and women in Israel and the world over. The organizing committee, headed by Dafna Lemish, billed the conference as “a process of shared thinking that might contribute toward social change.” As fate played its own drama, the conference coincided with the death of one of Israel’s leading feminist academics and activists, Dafna Izraeli. Thus, at the last minute, the conference turned into an event dedicated to her memory—a dedication that could not have been more appropriate. As Hannah Naveh, Chair of the NCJW Women’s and Gender Studies Program at Tel Aviv University, recalled from the podium, Dafna Izraeli represented a rare mix of a brilliant academic, an involved person, a generous benefactor, and a dedicated personal friend to all who knew her. In writing down some of the highlights of this intensive encounter, I intend not to give an account of entire panels, but rather to pull together some of the ideas and debates brought up by participants across the different disciplines and sessions. This is my way of keeping the dialogue going even after the conference is over, and, as I hope, involving more people in the burning issue of women and poverty. In the opening plenary session, Haya Stayer, Chair of the Department of Labor Studies at Tel Aviv University, voiced some criticisms of the con-