In particular, said its director, the program works to expand women's studies beyond its traditionally Western orientation. A major challenge is to accept that there are other ways of looking at gender relations. We must look at the world not just through women's eyes, but through very different women's eyes. GGC evolved from the Program on International Development and Women, founded in 1987. It was renamed the Program on Gender and Global Change in 1993 to more accurately reflect its philosophy and a changing world, Assie-Lumumba said.
Every nation is about development.
This year, for the first time, the program is offering Gender and Global Change Awards to undergraduates and graduates for summer research. For Assie-Lumumba, learning and teaching have always been global pursuits. She studied sociology, history and education in her native C te d'Ivoire and in France, Canada and the United States before teaching in Togo and at several U.S. colleges. When not teaching, she has been a policy analyst and adviser for many African organizations and units of the United Nations and World Bank. She is concerned that these women be heard but more so that they be empowered in a way that enables them to articulate policy direction.