The Skirball Cultural Center celebrates the extraordinary anthology 50 Years of Ms.: The Best of the Pathfinding Magazine that Ignited a Revolution (Knopf, September 2023) and engages attendees in a critical conversation to explore what the future of feminism and movement journalism demands: vision that is bold, imaginative, and collaborative.

During this daylong symposium, you’ll hear from activists and movement leaders working in LA, across the US, and around the world to advance equality. Activist leader Dolores Huerta will open the day with remarks from Pussy Riot founder Nadya Tolokonnikova, and a keynote address from Michele Bratcher Goodwin, Ms. Studios Executive Producer. 

During our breakout workshops, you can learn more about the Equal Rights Amendment with Ms. Executive Editor Katherine Spillar, Futures Without Violence founder Esta Soler, UCLA Williams Institute Executive Director Brad Sears, and Michele Bratcher Goodwin; talk reproductive justice and social change with artist and activist Michele Pred, Pandia Health founder Sophia Yen, Rabbi Sari Laufer, and Ms. Consulting Digital Editor Carmen Rios; and explore feminism beyond boundaries with NPR special correspondent Renee Montagne, Oscar-winning filmmaker Rayka Zehtabchi, and Afghan social rights activist Crystal Bayat. 

The symposium concludes with a keynote by former leader of the Black Panther Party Elaine Brown and a closing reception. Following the symposium, you'll have access to the Museum to see the Skirball's current exhibitions. Throughout the day, you’ll also have the chance to connect with organizations fighting for equality, get a copy of 50 Years of Ms. signed by our speakers, and snap something for your stories in a feminist photo booth.

This program is co-presented with Ms. and the Feminist Majority Foundation.

Welcome 

Assessing the current landscape we’re in, what led us here, and what will lead us toward a better future.

Breakout Session 1—Enshrining Our Rights in the US Constitution 

Ms. has long called for an Equal Rights Amendment, and the fight is more urgent than ever. This session explores the power of the Equal Rights Amendment to counter the loss of abortion rights, secure stronger laws to hold abusers accountable, and expand the gains of the last 50 years.

Breakout Session 2—Reproductive Rights in the Fight for Freedom

From its inception, Ms. was calling for reproductive freedom, and an end to attacks on abortion and family planning, as well as culture change to challenge stigmas around abortion and other reproductive justice issues. This session explores the ways culture change can fuel policy change and shift the landscape of reproductive rights.

Breakout Session 3—Changing the World for Women

The word ‘feminist’ is the same in most languages. And our fights are connected. This session explores the challenges women are facing globally—and why a global focus is needed within the feminist movement here at home.

Closing Keynote

Inspiring attendees to remember that, together, we can overcome the significant challenges facing women worldwide.

Crystal Bayat (کریستال بیات)—Crystal Bayat is an Afghan social activist and human rights advocate known for her protests against the Taliban takeover, advocacy for women rights, and political activism inside and outside Afghanistan. A native of the Ghazni province, Shia (coming from the Bayat family, a Turkic ethnicity minority) Bayat was born in 1997 in Kabul. She grew up most of her life with democracy and positive societal changes. She is currently continuing the fight to preserve Afghan human rights' achievements as an agent of change.

Elaine Brown—Elaine Brown is a former leader of the Black Panther Party—Minister of Information and Chairman, and currently serves as CEO of the non-profit organization Oakland & the World Enterprises, Inc., which is dedicated to launching and sustaining for-profit businesses for cooperative-ownership by formerly incarcerated people and other people facing monumental social barriers to economic survival. She is the author of A Taste of Power and The Condemnation of Little B. In March, the film rights to A Taste of Power were optioned for a major motion picture. Brown is presently co-authoring For Reasons of Race and Belief, The Trials of Jamil Al-Amin (H. Rap Brown) with Karima Al-Amin and completing the nonfiction book Melba and Al, A Story of Black Love in Jim Crow America.

Dr. Michele Bratcher Goodwin—Dr. Michele Bratcher Goodwin is the Executive Producer of Ms. Studios, host of the popular Ms. podcast On the Issues with Michele Goodwin and a frequent contributor to Ms. whose work appears in the 50 Years of Ms. collection. She is the Linda D. & Timothy J. O'Neill Professor of Constitutional Law and Global Health Policy at Georgetown University. She previously held the chancellor's professorship at University of California, Irvine, and founded and directed its Center for Biotechnology and Global Health Policy and its Reproductive Justice Initiative. Goodwin is an award-winning author and journalist whose work has been published by outlets like Forbes, Salon, L.A. Times, Politico, Chicago Sun-Times, Houston Chronicle, Christian Science Monitor, and the New York Times, and she is a global thought leader and advisor on matters related to law, society, and global health. 

Dolores Huerta—Dolores Huerta is a member of the Ms. Advisory Board and the Board of the Feminist Majority Foundation, which publishes Ms. magazine, and the founder and president of the Dolores Huerta Foundation. She was the co-founder, alongside Cesar Chavez, of the United Farm Workers Union—and remains a pillar of civil, labor, LGBTQ+, and women’s rights activism, anti-poverty efforts, and community organizing. Among her many accolades, Huerta was named Ms. magazine’s One of the Three Most Important Women in 1997, and in 2012, she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama. 

Sari Laufer—Sari Laufer is a rabbi at Stephen Wise Temple, a staunch feminist, an activist, and an educator. Her reading and teaching of the Torah is uniquely feminist, focused on telling the stories of those unseen, whose voices get lost in the text or are ignored by the priestly voice. As an educator and mother, Rabbi Laufer aims to create a new generation of activists, tying together her religious teachings with involvement in peaceful protests and local organizations. She prides herself on being a strong woman who has been successful and enjoyed both her career and motherhood. She graduated cum laude from Northwestern University and was ordained by Hebrew Union College's Jewish Institute of Religion.

Renee Montagne—Renee Montagne is a special correspondent and host for NPR News and previously served as a co-host of both NPR's All Things Considered and Morning Edition. Her work has transcended borders, covering anti-apartheid efforts in South Africa, conflict, inequality, and violence in Afghanistan, the role of African-American musicians in military bands from World War I to Vietnam, and, most recently, an investigation of the alarming rate of maternal mortality in the US.

Michele Pred—Michele Pred is a Swedish-American conceptual artist whose practice includes sculpture, assemblage, and performance. Her work uncovers the cultural and political meaning behind everyday objects, with a concentration on feminist themes such as equal pay and reproductive freedom. In 2018 she received a Pro-Choice Leadership Award from Personal PAC, Chicago. She has organized Feminist Art Parades in numerous cities and exhibited both nationally and internationally. Pred has been represented by the Nancy Hoffman Gallery in New York since 2004.

Carmen Rios—Carmen Rios is the Consulting Digital Editor at Ms. and former Managing Digital Editor for the magazine. In her work as a feminist writer, broadcaster, and community-builder, her pieces on queerness, gender, race, and class have been published by BuzzFeed, Bust, CityLab, DAME, ElixHER, Everyday Feminism, Feministing, Feminist Formations, GirlBoss, GrokNation, MEL, Mic, the National Women’s History Museum, SIGNS, and the Women’s Media Center; and she produced and hosted the popular feminist podcasts Popaganda, with Bitch Media, and The Bossy Show. Her work has been covered by outlets including NPR, CNN, the New York Times, The Washington Post, Vox, Good Morning America, and Jezebel.

Brad Sears—Brad Sears is the executive director of the UCLA School of Law’s Williams Institute—the country’s first national think tank dedicated to issues of sexual orientation law and policy and the only research center at a law school dedicated to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues.

Esta Soler—Esta Soler is the founder and president of Futures Without Violence, an organization that provides education, policy development, and training in an effort to recognize, reduce, and prevent gender-based violence while also caring for its victims. She, as the leader of FWV, led the charge to lobby for Congress to pass the Violence Against Women Act. After finding success in the US, Soler has turned her sights to the international sphere, where she is now advocating, alongside other anti-violence activists, for the passage of the International Violence Against Women Act. 

Katherine Spillar—Katherine Spillar is the Executive Editor of Ms. and editor of and contributor to 50 Years of Ms: The Best of the Pathfinding Magazine that Ignited a Revolution. Under her oversight, Ms. has increased its investigative reporting and in-depth analysis and today is the largest print and online feminist platform—reaching millions from across the globe via the quarterly print magazine, a vibrant and popular website, a robust daily and weekly e-newsletter mailing list, social media, the innovative digital textbook resource Ms. Classroom and audio and video programming from Ms. Studios. Spillar is also the Executive Director of Feminist Majority Foundation and Feminist Majority, national organizations working for women’s equality, empowerment, and non-violence. As one of the founders, she has been a driving force in executing the organizations' diverse programs securing women’s rights both domestically and globally since its inception in 1987.

Nadya Tolokonnikova—In 2012, artist Nadya Tolokonnikova gained global recognition and attention—and was sentenced to two years in prison—following “Punk Prayer,” an anti-Putin performance piece she and conspirators staged inside a cathedral in Moscow. She started a hunger strike protesting the conditions in which she was being held and was ultimately sent to a Siberian penal colony before being released in December 2013. Tolokonnikova is a founding member of Pussy Riot, the Russian feminist protest art collective which now counts hundreds of people among its numbers. A longtime thorn in Putin’s side, she was declared a “foreign agent” by Russia in 2021. She is also a cofounder of the independent news service and media outlet Mediazona and, as cofounder of UnicornDAO, was instrumental in raising more than 7 million dollars via UkraineDAO. She has spoken before the US Congress, British Parliament, and European Parliament. Among her many artistic achievements, she collaborated with Bansky on his Dismaland exhibition and created an immersive experience at the Saatchi Gallery in London. She is the author of Read & Riot: A Pussy Riot Guide to Activism.

Dr. Sophia Yen—Sophia Yen, M.D., M.P.H., is the CEO and Co-Founder of birth control delivery service Pandia Health and serves as a Clinical Associate Professor at Stanford Medical School in the Department of Pediatrics in the Division of Adolescent Medicine. She is also co-founder of The Silver Ribbon Campaign to Trust Women, SheHeroes.org, and the B2C campaign FFFFL.co (Female Founded, Female Led). 

Rayka Zehtabchi—Rayka Zehtabchi is an Iranian-American director and producer working in both documentary and fiction. Her Oscar-winning Netflix short documentary, Period. End of Sentence., which follows the women of a rural village in India's fight against menstruation stigma, was made in coordination with The Pad Project and Oakwood School's chapter of Girls Learn International—a project of the Feminist Majority Foundation, which publishes Ms. Zehtabchi has directed multiple branded documentary shorts, including United O for the Special Olympics, Ours To Tell for Planned Parenthood, and A Woman’s Place for KitchenAid, now on Hulu; and her films (SHn(y)o͞of), Just Hold On, Are You Still There?, and Long Line of Ladies have all received Vimeo Staff Picks and screened and won Jury awards at prestigious festivals such as Sundance and SXSW. 

California Coalition of Women Prisoners—Monitoring and challenging the abusive conditions inside California women’s prisons.

Feminist Majority Foundation - An ERA Activation—Building movement towards passing state-level ERAs across the nation.

Pandia Health—Providing expert care by expert doctors, resulting in fewer side effects from medications and the best experience for patients.

WriteGirl—Promoting creativity and self-expression to empower girls.

50 Years of Ms. is a remarkable collection—five decades of the magazine’s most startling, audacious, and norm-breaking pieces. Filled with iconic covers, photos, and letters to Ms., it features a foreword from Gloria Steinem and contributions by bell hooks, Alice Walker, Pauli Murray, Eleanor Smeal, Billie Jean King, Eleanor Holmes Norton, Allison Bechdel, Brittney Cooper, Joy Harjo, Toni Morrison, Audre Lorde, Adrienne Rich, Rita Dove and many more. 

Fifty years after its launch, Ms. remains a trusted feminist source for news, analysis, and commentary, and is more critical than ever as the fights for women’s rights and for democracy face new challenges. 

The book is as much a reflection of the past 50 years as it is a roadmap for the path forward.