Q&A Interview with LBCC Women Studies Instructor Devon Graham
Devon Graham has only been teaching at LBCC for a short time and has already made a lasting impression upon its faculty and students. She teaches women studies, a brand new program at LBCC which she is hoping will continue to be expanded upon. Being knowledgeable in a subject and being able to teach it do not always go hand in hand but they absolutely do for Graham.
It only takes five minutes sitting in on her class to realize how much passion she has for Women's Studies and for inspiring younger generations. The way she captures the attention of a room and guides her students in extremely relevant and in depth topics is a skill to be admired.
She explored many different paths and interests including a bachelor's degree in history, before ultimately finding her passion in Women's Studies and coming to LBCC. Between undergrad and LBCC she has worked a variety of positions including a barista, a nanny, a field organizer for NextGen Climate, and an academic advisor.
She manages to find ways, no matter how small, to bring joy into her life every day. Whether it’s the day’s first cup of coffee or a good book.
The phrase “practice what you preach" takes on a new meaning as Graham integrates the themes that she teaches into encounters in her daily life. She actively makes connections regarding systems and concepts such as capitalism and the social construction gender and how they are experienced in today's society. She draws inspiration from activists such as Bell Hooks and from her family.
10 Questions
What is one part of your day that you always look forward to the most?
Right, that’s such a good question, there's two and I guess they bracket the day. So one I really really appreciate is that first cup of coffee in the morning. It’s almost ritualistic, I take my cup of coffee outside in my backyard and sit with my dog or stand there for a minute even and do nothing but just drink my coffee, look at the world, check in on the weather and that's a delight because you don't have to start your day yet you know?
Then on the other end I think it is that moment when you've completed your work day, you've completed the dinner, dishes cleanup, or whatever tasks and you can just sit and breathe. I think that’s the highlight because OK I’ve done everything I need to do and I can just be a person and that's such a relief whenever that comes in a day.
What is one short-term and one long-term goal that you currently have?
My short-term goal is to do a pull up. I spend time working out, I lift weights here at the Linn- Benton gym (poorly) but I like exercising and running around and getting strong but I have some sort of block against doing a pull up. So that is a goal I am working on, is doing the little parts and then working it up, so doing a pull up is a goal of mine.
I think a longer-term goal is, actually it's about work, it's to bring the Women Gender Sexuality department… its brand new basically it's just been approved for Linn-Benton, fall term 2025 is its first official entry into the Linn-Benton world, and a long-term goal would be to make that be a mainstay of Linn-Benton. To make it be a very normal major for people to take and a robust major and for it to be known on campus and appreciated and enjoyed by a lot of people and reach a lot of people. So I think a longer-term goal would be developing connections between Linn-Benton and OSU and between just the whole community at Linn-Benton and the Women Gender Sexuality studies department.
What or who has been the biggest inspiration in your life in general?
I have to think about that for a second. I had a college professor. Her name was Dr. Amna Khalid and she was a history professor. I was a history major in undergrad, she was part of the reason. I went in not knowing my major and I took a class with her on modern Indian history like South Asia, India and of the twentieth century with her. She made it so relevant and so interesting, it wasn’t about memorizing facts like the stereotype of history is. It was like hey, how are systems of power and inequality and ideas about government and society shaping history and thus shaping today. It was so exciting that I think I ended up taking all of her classes, and she wasn’t a woman studies person, she was a historian but through all of her history she was very much a feminist. She was asking critical questions and asking questions about power and that I think was a massive inspiration for how to approach academia in general and how to approach doing history. I haven't seen her in years but she was absolutely instrumental in pushing me towards this work even though I never took a women's studies class with her, so that would be a big part of it yea.
If you had to pick just one favorite memory that you have of anything what would it be?
Anything? I’ve got to think about that. OK, yea I have one actually. I'm just going with my gut, but I had the opportunity to study abroad in college. Highly recommend if anyone has the chance. I did a ten week term in London and it was an English program, we were basically reading a lot of plays and seeing a ton of theater which was such a cool opportunity. Again I wasn’t an english major but we would basically read the play and then go see the show like three or four times a week kind of thing. We had the chance to go to Stratford- Upon- Avon where Shaespear performed and went to a couple of Shakespeare shows there and it was so cool.
I just have this memory of before the show, going out with my friends from the program and being able to drink alcohol legally there which was very important for a twenty year old from the states. Being able to buy our own alcohol and walk around the town go to the show like we were adults but also have this balance of being goofy feeding swans and goofing around but also like mixing that with oh no we were actually appreciating the cultural theater here. It was this great memory of being able to be an adult but also be silly and a child at the same time and that was really cool.
Did you always know you were going to pursue women's studies?
No, I definitely did not know that. My undergraduate degree was in history and I graduated having taken approximately one woman studies class. There was one at the very end of my senior year that I was like oh that was cool and that was about it.
I think I'd always been a feminist, my parents had always raised me to be about girl power, but definitely not. I actually went into political organizing for a while and I thought I was going to go to law school for a while. I took the LSAT, I was looking into all of that. So I really wasn't planning on doing this. I think actually what it was, there was a lot of things, but I think what I kept coming back to was like it was during the 2016 presidential election that I was like oh wow.
I kept thinking about sexism and misogyny and racism and this all connected because I’d been given those tools from undergrad to make those connections but I did not decide to do a women's studies graduate degree until multiple years out of college. So I had graduated college, was well into my twenties before I decided to go back to school for that. So yea I think it definitely was not always my path, I was very excited about a lot of things but could not make a decision, could not find a path that worked for me for a lot of years.
What is the rundown of what paths your education took, the schools you attended, the majors, any gap years?
I went to a public high school, Logan high school in La Crosse, Wisconsin and I went straight to college from there. Which I think is important to note because not everybody does, but I came from a family where I was always going to go to college. Both my parents had degrees, that was always going to be the case, but a lot of my high school classmates did not or maybe started but didn't finish or took gaps or I don't know what but I was always going to go.
I then went to Carleton College which is in Northfield Minnesota and it is a private four year just undergraduate college, very rigorous. So I did that and I lived on campus all four years, very different than a lot of places, and you don't have to determine your major until the end of your sophomore year. That’s a rule, you have almost two full years to make that decision and so that is a huge change. That is so different than a lot of colleges and I valued it so much because then I took classes to explore. I took classes that would fulfill a requirement but I also got to explore something.
So I actually decided on history really late, it was about that last term. So I really appreciated them giving me space to figure out what I wanted to do. So then I finished with just a history degree. I took two gap years, I graduated undergrad in 2016 and went to Iowa to work for the Democrats and on the presidential campaign. I then worked as a barista and I worked in a CO-OP grocery store. I just did service jobs for a few years because that's what was available, it’s hard to get a job with just a college degree right? It is.
Then after a lot of mulling over and thinking, then applied to graduate school and came to Oregon State University and did a masters degree in Women Gender Sexuality studies with a minor in Queer studies. That is the last time I’ve had to go to school and I have to say it is really nice. Not having to be constantly worried about doing homework is such a delight but I really liked school, I really liked school.
Is continuing with teaching whether at LB or elsewhere a goal that you have?
A hundred percent. It's a funny question because both my parents were elementary school teachers their whole careers. They always said I would go into teaching and I always said I won't. I told them over and over that’s not for me, teachings not for me and here I am. So jokes on me.
When I was a graduate student, OSU has masters students teach classes, it was part of the stipend, part of the program basically. It was then when I was a very young masters student thrown into teaching with very little preparation honestly, that I realised oh I’m more excited about this than I am my research. Than I was my thesis. I was like I’m more excited about the energy in the classroom and about the conversations that I’m having with these students, I’m way way more passionate about that.
So I hope it’s at Linn Benton, I hope I can be here to help the WGSS program grow like I said earlier but yea I hope whatever I do in the future I can be teaching. Particularly, I love the college level because you just get to have a certain level of conversation and you can very much have students lead discussions and guide where we're going and I think that is the most exciting thing, it’s the best.
What is the history of the women's studies program within LB and Oregon?
Wow what a question. It is brand new to Linn Benton. Actually, I credit my colleague Lauren Visconti, she is I won’t say the only but a main main main driver of the fact that we have a new major here. She is an Anthropology professor here and created from scratch basically, global women which is an anthropological kind of approach to women's studies.
Basically she saw a gap right? She was using her intersectional framework and was like what's missing here? She was saying there is no women's studies program and there should be. So she took the time to create classes, hire faculty like me, bring in part time instructors and she put together the entire proposal for the program. I think it’s important to remember that this stuff doesn't just happen. It took Lauren Visconti’s energy and hours and dedication to do it. Nobody said, hey do you want to build a new program? She said this program is needed, something is missing here and so it was only approved by the LBCC board last fall. It takes faculty with the capacity and with the passion.
However, WGSS has been a program at OSU since what 1970? It’s been about fifty years. It’s actually, fun fact, the second oldest women's studies department in the country. It followed San Diego State which was the very first and two years later OSU got its own. This came reportedly from a lawsuit where OSU had offered a professorship to a young man who was still working on a master’s degree while turning down a PHD holding female candidate for the same position. She sued and won the case of sexual discrimination in the workplace in 1970. Then this is the reported part, it's reported because it's kind of private, that then funding came from that settlement to create the first women's studies program at OSU. So that’s super exciting. It's why we were one of the earliest and it demonstrates I think how much individuals can have an impact on this kind of thing but also how activism is the root. A feminist activist approach was the root of this entire program here at OSU.
Do you have any advice or words of wisdom for current college students?
About anything? Yes I do have one piece. I’m passionate about this one. I think the one thing that makes me feel old, genuinely, is that there was not ChatGPT and AI when I was in college or highschool. That wasn’t a thing. If there was starting to become that type of tool in grad school it just wasn't good enough to be even worth it right? I'm not chastising students, I think it's here and we use it all the time in whatever capacity however the advice I would give students is be careful how you use ChatGPT and AI and whatever other source. Not because it's morally wrong or whatever but because I think it can become a disservice to you.
I think part of the great joy and privilege of getting a college education is this opportunity to focus on your own mind and capabilities and it is honestly such a beautiful thing. What other time in your life are you just there to develop your own abilities and critical thinking and thought processes and critical thinking. It’s just really really cool and I worry that being able almost hide behind AI or these other tools, like oh I'm worried I’m not a good enough writer so I'll use this thing. Or I really don’t have enough time. I know it’s a lot of time and it often comes down to that, so you’ll just have this thing do it.
It feels like a disservice to yourselves. At the end of the day you (all the students) and your brain and capabilities is the degree and is the whole point. So it breaks my heart to see students not trust themselves enough or not love themselves enough to really develop those skills. So I think AI is AI, it’s here, whatever. I really advice, love yourself enough to put in the work to learn how to write or how to respond or learn how to just think critically about this kind of thing.
What would you say is your guiding force in life, something or someone that you would not be who you are today without?
Wow, a guiding force in my life. I would probably say my dad. I just visited him this last weekend. He lives back in Wisconsin so I don’t see him very often but I think in terms of being a curious person and wanting to show interest in the world around me very much came from him. He was bringing me to protests when I was in elementary school about don't build this road in our wetlands, you know stuff like that. Almost being politically active but also being curious in the world around you. Aren’t you curious about this history, aren’t you curious about these politics? He demonstrated that to me and to this day we still have extensive conversations about how do Americans view the world? What are the changes in the last hundred years? I think he’s demonstrated to me intellectual curiosity and optimism, that is often difficult. I think just being excited about the world around us and passionate about it comes from my dad.
At a Glance:
Devon Graham
Age: 30
Family: Married to LB physical science instructor Jeremy Randolph-Flagg, they have a five year old dog Frankie. Has a younger sister in LaCrosse, Wisconsin. Has a niece and nephew, Eli and Iris, in Lexington Kentucky.
Occupation: Women's studies professor at LB
Hometown: La Crosse, Wisconsin
Education: Bachelor’s in history at Carleton College, master’s in women's studies at OSU
Hobbies: Reading, playing ultimate Frisbee
A Mantra She Lives By: Be Here Now
Contact Information: grahamd@linnbenton.edu
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