“The words of my mother became instilled in my head. ‘You can be the next Kang Tongbi.’”
This sentence, penned by a Barnard College applicant, inspired Barnard President Debora Spar to organize and moderate the College’s first ever symposium in China, titled Women Changing China. Tongbi, BC 1909, was Barnard’s first Chinese student and an advocate against foot binding. The Beijing event, which marked her centennial and was held on March 19, featured well-known Chinese women as panelists such as English professor and women’s advocate Wu Qing, novelist Geling Yan, Chinese-American filmmaker Ruby Yang, and media entrepreneur Yang Lan.
Panelists focused on the changing roles of women in China. According to a transcript of the event provided by Barnard, Lan called Tongbi “the first Chinese woman who was enrolled at Barnard—probably the first woman to receive Western higher education—100 years ago when most Chinese women were locked indoors at home with bound feet.” She said that, through the surveys she conducted on women’s employment in China, she had discovered that 70 percent of Chinese women would be willing to work even if it was not a financial necessity. She added, though, that many women have reported feeling mounting pressures during the global economic crisis.
Qing, an activist whom Spar called “the real deal” in a phone interview on Monday, spoke of the differences between today’s women and those of Tongbi’s generation but called for further change. “I think, for me, because I have more white hairs, I have experienced so many political movements, I’ve gone through so many things,” she said. “I see people suffer. Or historically, I saw many people purged, commit a suicide, or beaten to death, disowned by members of their family. And that’s what I want to change. I want to change the system itself.”
Courtesy of Barnard College.
Aside from the event, highlights of Spar’s trip included several visits with alumnae and educators and a stop at the opening of Columbia’s Global Center in Beijing.
As Spar spoke over the phone between connecting flights, she added that on Saturday, she visited the rural school run by Qing, also the 2001 recipient of the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Public Service. “She has about 20 girls from the poorest parts of China learning kindergarten teaching, some learning to do word processing,” Spar said. “We had a lot of girls at the symposium who were high school students, desperate to come to Barnard. The sad part is that there was a number of students who had applied this year, but there was no financial aid for them, and it breaks my heart.”
Barnard’s international students are not guaranteed financial aid, and Spar said that Barnard may eventually seek to remedy this by raising funds in regions abroad.
Spar visited three universities in Beijing and two in Seoul, where she said Barnard was met with “a huge amount of interest in sending off students.” Spar said she hopes to persuade some of these “inspirational” Chinese women to speak at Barnard.
Lan Li, BC ’10, commended Barnard for its outreach efforts in China. “I think that Barnard’s relationship with women in China serves a dual purpose in encouraging women to seek a liberal arts education in America where they really do have the freedom to study what they want outside of the social and cultural confines that might prevent them from doing so in China,” Li said. “For Barnard, as a women’s college, developing its relationship with international cultures is tremendously important to the growth of the college—financially, socially, and academically.”
As the symposium was being planned, Spar was already on her way to speak on a panel with economist Joseph Stiglitz at the Beijing opening of one of Columbia’s Global Centers.
In a trend that aligns with Columbia’s mission to become a “global university,” Barnard recently launched a slew of initiatives to further connect with the world outside its gates. These plans came to the fore last spring when Hilary Link took on the newly created position of assistant provost and dean for international programs. Spar stressed in her inauguration speech that she wished to see a larger flow of students to and from foreign countries and a greater awareness of Barnard’s name outside the U.S. On Monday, as Spar awaited a connecting flight in Houston, Texas, she revealed her pre-travel jitters over the phone. “It was quite nerve-wracking to see what would actually happen with so few people on the ground there,” she said. “It was amazing how it all came together.”
Joy Resmovits can be reached at joy.resmovits@columbiaspectator.com.
