Bea V. Larsen . . . .Commentaries

Bea V. Larsen is a Senior Mediator at the Center for Resolution of Disputes in
Cincinnati, Ohio 
Bea V. Larsen

For a number of years Bea V. Larsen, senior mediator at the Center for Resolution of Disputes in Cincinnati, Ohio [www.cfrdmediation.com], presented weekly commentaries on WVXU radio, both on her professional work as a mediator and on more personal or general experiences. These broadcasts reached thousands of listeners in a number of midwestern states and elicited many comments. This new series of online commentaries will continue that tradition, now broadcast to the world via the internet. Comments, which can be posted directly to this blog, are warmly encouraged. More personal background information can be read in the "Introductions" category below.
 

Jill Ker Conway

Print the article

This entry was posted on 7/28/2007 4:05 PM and is filed under Personally Speaking.

    By chance, I happened upon a CNN panel discussion and heard the words of an old friend I've never met. Not an impossibility, if we've experienced the world of that person through their own telling, in print.

     Jill Ker Conway became well known to me over ten years ago when I read the story of her early life. She is a woman in her seventies, retired as President of Smith College, and now a visiting scholar at M.I.T.

     "The Road From Corain" tells of Conway's youth growing up in Australia. After World War II, her father homesteaded vast acreage in the Outback, where the entire family took part in raising sheep for wool. Unlike her two older brothers, who had been sent off to boarding schools, she grew to age eleven without ever attending a formal school, although, interestingly, she was raised with the expectation that she would become equally as competent. (A message I too received from both parents.)   
    
    Even as sand storms howled around their ranch home, set miles from the nearest neighbor, her mother laid her evening table with linen, silver and crystal, as caught up as most Australians raised pre-World War II, in allegiance to the standards of the British upper class. Valiant in her support of her husband and young family, as they dealt with the adversity of a prolonged devastating drought and extreme heat, she delivered mixed messages to her daughter about what it meant to be a woman. Modeling great strength and expecting high academic achievement, she also offered her not so subtle advice to hide her intelligence, in order to be popular with young men.(All messages I too received.)
   
    Following the premature death of her father, the Ker family moved to Sidney. On graduating from the University with highest honors, she was denied the employment opportunities offered to her male colleagues, and fully wakened to the dichotomy of the treatment of men and women. (In 1969, the year of my graduation, law firms hired no women attorneys.)

     Eventually Conway immigrated to the U.S. as a history scholar and continued her graduate education, becoming a renowned educator and author of many acclaimed books.

     Conway and I share a historical context. When I read her next volume of autobiography, "True North", I'll be able to compare how we experienced the radicalization of many women in the sixties and seventies and the changes since that time. The demands of those years are now common place expectations. Young girls today are born to these expectations and have no need to be covert.
 
    Reading about the real life of another, hearing the voice of the author, illuminates our own life. I will likely never meet Jill Ker Conway, yet I know her well, and she has helped to give my world definition.
 

What did you think of this article?




Trackbacks
Trackback specific URL for this entry
  • No trackbacks exist for this post.
Comments
    Display comments as (Linear | Threaded)

    • 7/29/2007 6:57 AM Sherry wrote:
      This is the kind of stuff I was thinking could make up an entire book. Your thoughts, feelings, experience, beliefs as you grew up - through your childhood, work life, marriage - and now. How your life developed with the times - how you changed, what you learned, your inner world as you went from one life stage to another. What inspired you to do all the things that you have done (and it has been alot!!!) What your marriage meant to you, what your children taught you, what you still seek in your intellectual and emotional growth. What you can tell all of us about you and your life - about LIFE. You have an enormous amount to share - just do it in a different format. One long, fascinating story about you. I didn't read the Didion book - and I am not suggesting you talk about death - rather that you talk about life. Your 500 word reflections then become a continual string of a long story and exposes a long life of thoughts, experiences, wisdom. I think this would get you published. It would be quite personal - but oh how interesting to many!
      Reply to this
    Leave a comment

    Submitted comments are subject to moderation before being displayed.

     Name

     Email (will not be published)

     Website

    Your comment is 0 characters limited to 3000 characters.



      
    Copyright . http://BEALARSEN.COM. All rights reserved.