'Clare at 50: Hope and experience in a postfeminist age'
by Professor Polly O'Hanlon (1972)

A 50th Anniversary Lecture

I will be offering some of my own recollections of Clare in the early 1970s, and comparing our hopes and assumptions then with the very different ways we think about gender equality in higher education in the present day.  Across half a century of rapid social change, and the much more complex ‘postfeminist’ world that we now live in, I’ll be asking: does our student experience from the early 1970s have any relevance at all in the present day?

- Professor Polly O'Hanlon

Princeton Graphic Arts Collection: The effigy of the female cyclist hung by the protestors

Princeton Graphic Arts Collection: The effigy of the female cyclist hung by the protestors

Getty images/Hulton Archive: ‘Get you to Girton, Beatrice, get you to NewnhamThere’s no place for you maids’

Getty images/Hulton Archive: ‘Get you to Girton, Beatrice, get you to NewnhamThere’s no place for you maids’

BBC News

BBC News

Cambridge News: 1948: the Queen Mother takes a degree

Cambridge News: 1948: the Queen Mother takes a degree

A Mem Court room, much improved

A Mem Court room, much improved

Mem Court, its character as a memorial to the fallen of WW1 still intact

Mem Court, its character as a memorial to the fallen of WW1 still intact

The screens on ‘H’ staircase, in more austere days

The screens on ‘H’ staircase, in more austere days

Cambridge News: Garden House ‘riot’ 1970

Cambridge News: Garden House ‘riot’ 1970

The Hall: chairs now, but benches then!

The Hall: chairs now, but benches then!

Varsity: Ulster’s ‘Troubles’ on Trinity Street, 1968

Varsity: Ulster’s ‘Troubles’ on Trinity Street, 1968

Nursery Action Group outside the Senate House, 1977

Nursery Action Group outside the Senate House, 1977

Prams vs. lawns, King’s, 1970s

Prams vs. lawns, King’s, 1970s

Item 1 of 12

Princeton Graphic Arts Collection: The effigy of the female cyclist hung by the protestors

Princeton Graphic Arts Collection: The effigy of the female cyclist hung by the protestors

Getty images/Hulton Archive: ‘Get you to Girton, Beatrice, get you to NewnhamThere’s no place for you maids’

Getty images/Hulton Archive: ‘Get you to Girton, Beatrice, get you to NewnhamThere’s no place for you maids’

BBC News

BBC News

Cambridge News: 1948: the Queen Mother takes a degree

Cambridge News: 1948: the Queen Mother takes a degree

A Mem Court room, much improved

A Mem Court room, much improved

Mem Court, its character as a memorial to the fallen of WW1 still intact

Mem Court, its character as a memorial to the fallen of WW1 still intact

The screens on ‘H’ staircase, in more austere days

The screens on ‘H’ staircase, in more austere days

Cambridge News: Garden House ‘riot’ 1970

Cambridge News: Garden House ‘riot’ 1970

The Hall: chairs now, but benches then!

The Hall: chairs now, but benches then!

Varsity: Ulster’s ‘Troubles’ on Trinity Street, 1968

Varsity: Ulster’s ‘Troubles’ on Trinity Street, 1968

Nursery Action Group outside the Senate House, 1977

Nursery Action Group outside the Senate House, 1977

Prams vs. lawns, King’s, 1970s

Prams vs. lawns, King’s, 1970s