Any Person, Many StoriesHistories of Exclusion and Inclusion at Cornell
Do stories from the past help us move toward inclusion today? How does it feel to discover stories of exclusion? What strategies have students, faculty, staff used in the past to gather courage, survive, and thrive at Cornell? The aim of this project is to foster an abiding sense of belonging for everyone in the Cornell community by sparking genuine, necessary conversations about Cornell’s past, present, and future.
FEATURED STORY
From Ladies’ Home Journal to Title IX: Women Graduate Students at Cornell,1958-1962
Ours is the story of a group of women who eschewed conventional ’50s ideas about the role of women. Determined to take our places in the professions, we enrolled in The Graduate School at Cornell in 1958.
Kimi Gengo: Author, Advocate, Asian American
Kimi Gengo was a literary pioneer and advocate for Japanese Americans. During her time at Cornell, Gengo published her first verses in The Columns, a Cornell literary magazine.
Fighting for More than an MRS Degree: Contraception, Abortion, and Equal Access to Education
Imagine you are a young woman in 1968. Cornell was among the few options that accepted women…What challenges did young women have to overcome to claim their education at Cornell?
The exhibition includes contributions from students, instructors, staff, alumni, and community members. This project would not exist without their careful research and interpretations. We are also grateful for the financial support from the Belonging at Cornell initiative, partnership with the Cornell University Library and Johnson Museum, and the collaboration of our participating instructors. We hope this project becomes a shared exploration of Cornell’s, and our, aspiration toward “…any person…any study.”
