Liddy Detar Oral History Interview, February 27, 2020

Partial Transcript: So my name is Liddy Detar, and my pronouns are they, them their and she, her, hers.

Segment Synopsis: Liddy states her name, pronouns, date and location of the interview.

Segment Synopsis: She was born in New Hampshire in 1969 and lived there until she was 6-7. Then moved to outside of Boston for about a year. They moved around a lot. Her biological father was a faculty member at Dartmouth but her parents divorced when she was young so she wasn't raised by her father. Her mother was born to Hungarian and German immigrants outside of New York City. Her mother, before she had children was heavily involved in women civil rights movements. Her mother rubbed off on her through community involvement and sense of commitment. Liddy grew up in a mixed race family that contributed to an early awareness of her surroundings. While this had an impact on her life, it wasn't her inspiration to study of liberal arts. She enjoyed reading and writing but realized she did not have the theoretical knowledge that she needed. This lead her to her to pursue her higher education.

Keywords: Civil Rights; Dartmouth; New Hampshire; New York City

Partial Transcript: I had a faulty person in women's studies that once said, "You will not know the sheltering sky you are under, until it disappears."

Segment Synopsis: Liddy received her undergraduate degree in English, French, and Women's Studies from Barnard College in 1991. Barnard did not have a comparative literature major which she would have been interesting in studying. She was going to school at a time when it was not completely accepted to major in women's studies. Her step father who was supporting her through college had originally wanted her to study internationally business but she wanted to study creative writing and critical thinking. With the help of faulty, she created her own major which helped her apply to graduate schools later on. The college was in New York City which was a major factor. She was very involved in her community there. She worked at PEN which is a international human rights organization for writers. She helped with many projects that were global and local. She also worked for the National Book Awards. As Barnard was a women's school, she felt vey supported and only felt gender role pressures outside of college. She didn't know about feminist growing up but learned about it in college. In a first year seminar, her teacher mentioned a new interpretation of the Odyssey ending. When Odysseus's Wife hesitated to welcome him back, she was negotiating the power she had made for herself while he was gone. She now wanted to see the world and writings with this new lens and interpretations.
Liddy also got a masters in literature in and PhD in feminist literature studies and women studies from University of California, Santa Cruz. It was very theoretical based and immersed in feminist literature theory. She was very involved again in the community there. With faulty, she supported a pregnant and parenting program in the area. At the time, the applied PhD was new and less defined. This compared to what she sees now at OSU is very different.
Liddy explains the differences between the two campuses that she attended and OSU.

Keywords: Barnard; Feminist; Gender Role; Human rights for writers; National Book Awards; New York City; Odyssey; PEN; PhD; Santa Cruz; University of California

Partial Transcript: So that identities and intercepting perspectives are just like breathing air, it's what we do. It's not a week. Its not a hyper visability that then gets packed up and we go on with business. It's about business changing, being transformed with more citizenship.

Segment Synopsis: She came to OSU in 2012. She had taken some time off and had moved to the Oregon Coast. She was not teaching at the time because she was taking care of one of her children who was chronically ill. She decided that she needed a community around her for support and reached out to Susan Shaw. Liddy was brought on to write a proposal for a new PhD program and was given other tasks as well. Coming into the liberal arts program, her first impression of OSU was a little different than others might be. As time went on, she became more connected to other parts of the college through advising and career development. Many of her students are in other parts of the college and then minor in women's studies. This way she hears many different perspectives across the campus. Liddy acknowledges the changes that she has seen in students since she has been here. One example is normalizing asking for pronouns. In regards to supporting the LGBTQ+ community, she believes we are headed in the right direction but the institution needs to keep listening to the community and adjusting accordingly. We need to think about what belonging means in a community and how a community is transformed. There are many faulty, administrators, and students that are invested in this issue.

Keywords: Advising; Career Development; LGBTQ; Liberal Arts

Segment Synopsis: One message that Liddy wants to get across to her advising students, is you are successful, you will be successful. There is also this right and responsibility students have to care for yourself with resources offered to help themselves. Liddy explains what she has learned from students and states that she has to stay humble in her advising position to be open to learning from her students. She enjoys the reflections that she has heard from her students informally or formally. For her students that are in male dominated fields, she provides advise to made strategic networks within those spaces. It all connects to having a supportive community. She also helps students identify what their inter-circle is where they can get support from.

Keywords: Advising; Humble; Open Minded; Strategic Networks; Success; Supportive Community

Partial Transcript: Its been a profound moment of needing the institution to support us and in some cases, literally contribute to saving our lives.

Segment Synopsis: Liddy stresses the sense of community and how important it is. She relates to her personal life and OSU as she was faced with an health issues in her family. In this situation, OSU and the faulty around her gave them a incredible amount of support. Not just emotional support, but necessary resources that their family needed.

Keywords: Community; Family Medical Leave; Health; support