Our Work

Formed by women from the Barnard College Class of 1971, BC Voices amplifies American women’s fight for economic, political and social power, historically and today, by harnessing the power of personal storytelling across multiple generations to illuminate the personal impact in women’s lives of having, and the consequences of not having, economic independence, voting rights, gender equity, reproductive freedom, affirmative action, and freedom from sexual harassment.

Through an online docuseries, documentary shorts, and an oral history collection, BC Voices seeks to motivate audiences of all genders to preserve women’s hard-won rights and to join the ongoing struggle for full gender equity.

Online DocuSeries

Current project: Stand UP, Speak OUT, a docuseries that tells the story of the radical transformation in women’s lives empowered by the mid-20th century advancement of women’s rights. The story unfolds through 6 episodes, each focusing on a specific right that dramatically changed women’s lives over the past 50 years.

Diverse women from multiple generations who lived through the political, cultural, and social changes of the mid-1900s share how their lives changed as women gained the legal right to equal pay, voting rights, reproductive autonomy, marriage equity, affirmative action, and freedom from sexual harassment.

The goals of Stand UP, Speak OUT are to increase awareness about what has been achieved and the hard-won freedom, independence, and opportunities in jeopardy today; and to inspire engagement in the continuing fight for gender equity.

Learn more about the docuseries and start watching…

Documentary Shorts

Starting in 2011, BC Voices commissioned two documentary shorts about the women of the Barnard College Class of 1971, women who came of age during the tumult of the mid-20th century.

The Way It Was recounts the impact of the seismic political and cultural shifts of the late 1960s and early 1970s on these young women at Barnard. Making Choices, Forging Paths traces the choices these women made in the years that followed as doors opened for women, but not all the way.

The Way It Was screened as part of Barnard’s 125th Anniversary Celebration, and Making Choices, Forging Paths premiered during Barnard’s 2016 Reunion Weekend.

Responses from audiences ranging in age from 18 to 80 tell us that the stories of alumnae of the Barnard Class of 71 are the universal stories of women of the 60s, women who rode the crest of 2nd Wave Feminism, as well as the stories of women of all eras.

The Way It Was

It’s 1967/1968 and the women of the Barnard Class of 1971 are finding their way as the world they’ve known shifts dramatically under their feet. The Pill is available and sexual mores are changing. The Columbia campus is embroiled in demonstrations against the growing Vietnam War and Columbia University’s plan to encroach on Harlem, beginning with the construction of a gym in Morningside Park. Then, it’s April 1968. Martin Luther King, Jr. is assassinated. Hurt and outraged, Harlem residents rebel. Students take over buildings at Columbia University. A strike is called and classes are canceled. Listen to 17 BC’71 alums tell what it was like to navigate these tumultuous times as young women coming of age when the world changed forever. Produced by Michelle Patrick, BC’71, and Robert Solomon.

To view this film, please visit:
The Way It Was.

Making Choices, Forging Paths

It’s 1971. The women of BC’71 are leaving Barnard and stepping into the world. There’s an excitement in the air as they join the wave of college-educated women entering the professional work force in droves for the first time in history. Doors are opening for them; the world is their oyster. And, then … sexism still exists … racism still exists – in the workplace, at home. Choices are made as they balance career and family. Follow 22 BC’71 alums as they face barriers, overcome obstacles, and persevere in making a difference in the world, forging paths for themselves and future generations of women. Produced by Ducat Media, LLC and BC Voices Inc.

To view this film, please visit:
Making Choices, Forging Paths.

Oral History Collection

BC Voices completed the Barnard Class of 1971 Oral History Collection in 2015. The Collection reflects the diversity of the women of the Barnard Class of 1971 in their geographic, socio-economic, and ethnic backgrounds, as well as the choices they have made, the careers they have pursued and the lives they have lived since their Barnard days.

The 79 oral histories provide rich, primary source material about women who came of age during the tumultuous period of the late 1960s and early 1970s, and illuminate the many issues that touched women’s lives from 1949 to the present.

The Barnard Archives and Special Collections hosts the video tapes and transcripts that make up the Barnard Class of 1971 Oral History Collection. The collection is in active use by scholars at Barnard and Columbia, and the transcripts have been digitized by the Barnard Archives to make them widely available to scholars and to the general public.

Barnard College alumnae from the Class of 1971 speak fully and frankly about:

growing up in the Jim Crow south;
being the child of Holocaust survivors;
growing up in poverty or relative privilege;
life and learning at a Seven Sisters college;
occupying buildings in 1968, witnessing events from the outside or, as a commuter, coming home every night to questioning parents;
participating in the social movements of their time including civil rights, feminism, anti-war activism, reproductive justice, gay liberation, anti-racism, and more;
pursuing careers and making a difference;
facing challenges, including sexism, at home and at work;
raising children and caring for aging parents;
reinventing themselves as they head into retirement.

These conversations document the diverse ways a generation of women caught up in the tsunami of Second Wave Feminism has coped with change and made change; faced discrimination and broken through barriers; balanced work and family and made hard choices; lived lives very different from their own mothers and cleared pathways for future generations.

Visit the Barnard Digital Collection to access these stories. For more information about the Digital Collection, email Archives@barnard.edu.

Oral History Interviewers

Frances Garrett Connell, BC’71
Michelle A. Patrick, BC’71
Carla Wengren Ricci, BC’71
Janet Ruth Price, BC’71
Katherine J. Brewster, BC’71
Adele Bernhard, BC’18
Amanda Breen, BC’17
Jenna Davis, BC’15
Kelly Reller, BC’16

Oral History Interviewees

Patricia A. Auspos
Ruth Stuart Bell
Beryl Benacerraf
Bettina E. Berch
Barbara L. Bernstein
Katherine J. Brewster
Constance Brown
Dona Summers Carter
Frances Garrett Connell
Catherine Bilzor Cretu
Darlene A. Dartt
Katherine M. Galvin
Mary Gorayeb Friberg
Ellen Geiger
Margery Isacson Goldberg
Mary Kane Goldstein
Ann Ellen Goodstein
Mary Gordon
Barbara Gottlieb
Loren Wissner Greene
Joy Horner Greenberg
Lynne Haims
Michael Hart
Adele Keyes Homer
Sandra Willner Horowitz
Candace Howes
Christine Jaronski
Lynn Forberg Julian
Linda Parnes Kahn
Shulamit Beth Kahn
Deborah Kahen Kayman
Vajra A. Kilgour
Shelley J. Korshak
Esther Amini Krawitz
Kathie L. Krumm
Heather Kurze
Wilma B. Liebman
Beth Lief
Ellen Falek Leonard
Carolyn J. Lewis
Jocelyn S. Linnekin
Lily Soohoo Louie
Ruth M. Louie
Mary Jane Major
Linda Elovitz Marshall
Fay Chew Matsuda, in memoriam
Christine McDonnell
Patricia A. McGovern
Carrie Menkel-Meadow
Xiomara Cortes Metcalfe
Joyce Monac
Janis Checkanow Nelson
Patria Baradi Pacis
Michelle A. Patrick
Gail J. Perlick
Janet Ruth Price
Caroline Quigley
Ayxa J. Rey-Diaz
Carla Wengren Ricci
Victoria Taylor Robertson
Meri-Jane Rochelson
Joyce Montgomery Rocklin
Julia Hong Sabella
Adrienne C. Schure
Martha Barzler Schweitzer
Barbara Ginsberg Shaw
Susan Slyomovics
Carol Santaniello Spencer
Karla Spurlock-Evans
Vikki Stark
Andrea Polk-Stephenson
Linda Graves Stewart
Maureen Ann Strafford
Deborah Lifschitz Veach
Agavni Pontish Zambak Yeramyan
Cheryl J. Weiner
Basha Yonis
Linda Balagur Peyster Zappulla