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Keynote
For more information, contact Kathleen Carot at kcarot@oakton.edu or 847.376.7061. |
Oakton Students Oakton’s Women’s and Gender Studies program is partially funded by the Board of Student Affairs and the Oakton Educational Foundation. The Women’s and Gender Studies Steering Committee
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Sara Paretsky No contemporary feminist writer evokes the essence of Chicago more powerfully thanSara Paretsky. Paretsky revolutionized the mystery fiction world in 1982 with the introduction of private investigator V.I. Warshawski in the novel, Indemnity Only. By creating a strong female character who uses her wits as well as her fists, Paretsky challenged the conventions of a genre in which women typically wereportrayed as victims or vamps. Eleven more Warshawski novels |
followed, including the most recent, Fire Sale. All are bestsellers, published in 24 languages. “Paretsky is unique among the women writing about women,” says The Los Angeles Times. “Among today’s P.I.s, nobody comes close to Warshawski,” adds Publishers Weekly. In addition to her Warshawski novels, Paretsky’s Ghost Country blends comedy, magic, and gritty realism on Chicago’s mean streets. She also is the editor of three short story collections. Paretsky’s deep-rooted concern for social justice is the hallmark of her novels and has carried her voice beyond the world of crime fiction. In her powerful new book, Writing in an Age of Silence, she explores the traditions of political and literary dissent that have informed her life and work, against the backdrop of repression of free speech in the U.S. As a frequent contributor to The New York Times’ op-ed page, and a speaker at the Library of Congress, Oxford University, and the University of Chicago, she is an impassioned advocate for those on society’s margins. Not only has Paretsky broken barriers with her work, she also has helped open doors for other women writers. Her role in founding Sisters in Crime, an organization that supports women mystery writers, prompted Ms. Magazine to name Paretsky “Woman of the Year” in 1988. In 2002, the British Crime Writers Association awarded her the Cartier Diamond Dagger for lifetime achievement. Paretsky has been a visiting scholar at Oxford University and a visiting professor at Northwestern University. Her work is celebrated in the documentary, Women of Mystery, and she has been the recipient of three honorary doctorates. To give back to the community, Paretsky has established scholarships at the University of Kansas, including a special prize for students doing creative work in the arts or sciences. In 2001, she established the Sara and Two C-Dogs Foundation, which primarily supports girls and women in the arts and sciences. She also has mentored Chicago inner city school students. Paretsky grew up in eastern Kansas. She and her four brothers attended a two-room country school. That’s where Paretsky began her lifelong love of baseball and underdogs – playing third base for a school team that always finished at the bottom of its rural league. In her first published work, which appeared in The American Girl magazine when she was 11 years old, she recounted surviving a tornado with her schoolmates. While at the University of Kansas, Paretsky traveled to Chicago to do community service under the direction of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. She later received both a MBA and doctorate in history from the University of Chicago. |
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