“Women’s Rights are Human Rights:” Launching a Georgetown Exhibition
“If there is one message that echoes forth from this conference, let it be that women’s rights are human rights, and human rights are women’s rights, once and for all.”
– Then First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, 1995
Join us to launch a new exhibition at the Georgetown University Library that explores how the United States prepared for and participated in the historic United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women, hosted in Beijing in 1995.
The exhibition draws on memos, posters, brochures, souvenirs, letters, and photographs from the archives of Ambassador Melanne Verveer and considers how the ripple effects generated by the Beijing Conference significantly impacted American foreign policy.
Panelists will discuss their preparations for the conference and for Hillary Clinton’s visionary speech and reflect on the lasting impact of the conference on US foreign policy.
This event is open to current Georgetown Students, Faculty, and staff. You will be required to show a Georgetown ID to enter the library and face masks are required. Seating will be allocated on a first-come, first-serve basis.
Featuring:
Ambassador Melanne Verveer
Executive Director of the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security
Ms. Lissa Muscatine
Former speechwriter to First Lady Hilary Clinton and primary author of her historic 1995 Beijing speech
Ms. Theresa Loar
Former diplomat and Director of the State Department’s global conference secretariat
Dr. Keith Gorman
Director of the Booth Family Center for Special Collections
GIWPS wishes to thank Rebecca Turkington, Melanne Verveer, and LuLen Walker for their shared vision and collaboration in the development, design, content creation, and installation of the exhibition in Lauinger Library.
This is part of an event series marking the 25th anniversary of the Beijing conference, which will culminate in an awards ceremony on December 6, 2021, featuring Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton and Secretary Madeleine Albright, who led the US delegation to Beijing.
Co-sponsored by the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security, the Georgetown University Library, and the Women’s and Gender Studies Program.