April
23 ,
2004
Kim
Campbell, Canada's First Woman Prime Minister, to Give
Commencement Address
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Kim
Campbell
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Kim
Campbell, who in 1993 became the first woman to serve as
prime minister of Canada, will speak at Mount Holyoke's one
hundred
and sixty-seventh commencement, Sunday, May 23. Campbell will
be joined by three other honorary degree recipients: Nadine
Strossen,
the president of the American Civil Liberties Union; Dorothy
J. Height, a leader in the liberation struggle of African American
women; and Nancy Skinner Nordhoff '54, philanthropist and founder
of Hedgebrook, a writer's colony for women.
Before becoming prime minister, Campbell held cabinet positions
as Minister of State for Indian Affairs and Northern Development,
Minister of Justice and Attorney General, and Minister of National
Defence and Veterans'Affairs. She was the first woman
to hold the Justice and Defence positions, and the first woman
to
be defence minister of a NATO country. Campbell participated
in major international meetings including the Commonwealth,
NATO, the G-7 Summit, and the United Nations General Assembly.
In September
2000, Campbell completed a four-year term as Consul General
of Canada in Los Angeles, serving the states of California,
Utah,
Nevada, Arizona, Hawaii, and the Territory of Guam. She is
currently a lecturer in public policy at the John F. Kennedy
School of
Government at Harvard University.
A long-standing champion of women's rights, Campbell chaired
the Council of Women World Leaders from 1999 to 2003. Based
at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, the council's
membership consists of women who hold or have held the office
of president or prime minister in their own country. In October
2003, Campbell was named president of the International Women's
Forum, a global organization of women of significant and diverse
achievement. On January 1, 2004 she assumed the position of
secretary general of the Club of Madrid, an organization of
former heads
of government and state who work to promote democratization
through peer relations with leaders of transitional democracies.
Campbell was educated at the University of British Columbia
(B.A., 1969; L.L.B., 1983) and the London School of Economics
(doctoral
studies in Soviet government, A.B.D., 1970--1973). She has
held fellowships at the John F. Kennedy School of Government
at Harvard and UCLA, is an honorary fellow of the London School
of Economics, and was a regents' lecturer at the University
of California, Irvine. Her best-selling political memoir Time
and Chance was published in 1996 by Doubleday Canada.
Dorothy J. Height
For more than half a century, Dorothy Height's leadership has
advanced the liberation struggle of black women. A national leader
in the civil rights movement, Height has worked for 70 years
toward racial and gender equality. She served for more than 30
years as the president of the National Council of Negro Women
and held leadership positions at the YWCA, where she pushed for
racial inclusiveness. Her work has helped countless women in
America and around the world participate in democratic reform
resulting in new opportunities for themselves, their families,
and their communities. She received the Citizens Medal Award
from President Ronald Reagan in 1989 and the Medal of Freedom
from President Bill Clinton in 1994. On March 24 of this year
she was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in a ceremony at
the U.S. Capitol.
Nancy Skinner Nordhoff '54
Nancy Nordhoff '54 devoted herself to fundraising and philanthropy
in the Seattle, Washington, area for 25 years before founding
Hedgebrook, a retreat for women writers on Whidbey Island,
Washington. Hedgebrook is open to women writers around the world
and, since
1988, has welcomed more than 800 women, ranging in age from
17 to 82, from Barbados, Canada, England, Mexico, the Philippines,
South Africa, Thailand, the United States, and Zimbabwe.
Nadine Strossen
Nadine Strossen, professor of law at New York Law School, has
written, lectured, and practiced extensively in the areas of
constitutional law, civil liberties, and international human
rights. Since 1991, she has served as president of the American
Civil Liberties Union, the first woman to head the nation's
largest and oldest civil liberties organization. (Because the
ACLU presidency
is a volunteer post, Strossen continues in her faculty position
as well.) The National Law Journal has twice named Strossen
one of "The 100 Most Influential Lawyers in America." In
1996, Working Woman magazine listed her among the "350 Women
Who Changed the World 1976--1996."
Commencement begins at 10:30 AM in Gettell Amphitheater. In
the event of rain, the event will be held in the Kendall Field
House.
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