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November Papaleo, a graduate student in women's studies and English, is currently aspiring to publish a paper she wrote on MySpace body objectification.

Imprints: Taking passion to the next level

Grad student November Papaleo uses her enthusiasm, dedication to make change

By: Amanda Robbins

Posted: 4/5/07

"What you see is what you get," said women studies director Susan Shaw, about November Papaleo's attitude, passion and personality.

Papaleo's first name means "new embers," which is why her parents chose it.

"I was their first child and I was a new beginning for them as a couple - I was a new spark."

Papaleo is a graduate student working toward her master's degree in women studies and English as well as a graduate teaching assistant. Currently she is preparing her thesis paper on Myspace and body objectification.

"I did a class presentation on photos my friends had posted online of themselves," Papaleo said. "The photos were of them almost nude. I compared these photos to ones where young women modeled professionally and the two were very close to the same."

Papaleo went on to get an A on the presentation and thought it would be an interesting thesis paper.

"I am still in the beginning stages, but eventually I want to publish it and then go for my Ph.D.," she added.

Papaleo does not know where she wants to go yet, but she is looking at colleges nationally and internationally.

Along with being a student, Papaleo is currently working on a project called Hollaback Pacific Northwest, which is based on Hollaback NYC.

The Web site states that Hollaback's primary goal is to call out street harassers, critique sexually aggressive/suggestive/sexist clothing, and to reduce sexual terrorism by providing an anonymous outlet to share stories and tales of support.

"There is a program in the women studies department that allows students to go to conferences about feminist organizing in New York and Washington D.C.," Papaleo said. "We spent 10 days in New York and three days in Washington D.C. assisting organizations that benefit women and children."

On this trip the students were supposed to meet the Hollaback NYC panel, but they ended up getting stuck on the subway.

"During this trip we had lots of late night discussions about issues such as street harassment," Papaleo said.

Also on the trip, one of Papaleo's colleagues saw a man, on NYU's campus, wearing shirt that said, "freshman girls - get 'um while they are skinny." After seeing this she asked him why he was wearing it.

"He basically gave her a bunch of excuses about not having clean laundry and that the shirt was funny," Papaleo said.

Her colleague questioned the message he was sending out and told him he should turn his shirt inside out.

"The response she got from him was not good," Papaleo said. "But later we ran into that same guy and he had his shirt turned inside out. We have to not be afraid to call out unacceptable behavior."

Based on this and other incidents, Papaleo thought it would be a good idea to bring Hollaback to the Pacific Northwest.

"There was already a Hollaback Seattle that was set up by Luke Lee," Papaleo said. "I contacted him and he e-mailed me back saying that he was going to disassemble his site and make a new one that included all of the Pacific Northwest."

Working with Lee, Papaleo does most of the public speaking and class presentations, while Lee does everything else.

In her presentations, Papaleo explains what people can do with the Web site, such as posting an offensive incident that happened to them. She also said people are allowed to take pictures of the person with their camera phones and post them on the site, but personal information about the offender will not be listed.

"Campus fits into my life," she said. "Off campus doesn't."

Although Papaleo does help run Hollaback Pacific Northwest, her primary job is being a student.

She started out as a cultural anthropologist at Washington State University - getting her first bachelor's degree in anthropology.

"I was just happy showing up during high school and my first four years of college," Papaleo said about not being enthusiastic about the courses. "I took a Bible as Literature course and my professor suggested that I take intro to women studies."

This was when things started to change for Papaleo. She had a place for her passion to be expressed.

"That was where this started. I actually started to care about what I was learning about and it is where my passion lies."

Papaleo went on to get another bachelor's degree in women studies. Papaleo has never been a "girly girl."

"I got Barbies and decapitated them because they were not GI Joes," Papaleo said. "Who is built like that? Their heads floated and the rest of their body didn't. I also didn't wear a skirt until I was 14. I had to dress nice for my soccer games."

Shaw recruited Papaleo to OSU when they met at a conference in Vancouver. Shaw said she likes having Papaleo as a student.

"I like teaching her because she cares," Shaw said. "She digs deeper, works hard and wants to be a good student. She has a great sense of humor," Shaw said. "She has a gentle and funny sarcasm, which makes it easy to tease her and give her a hard time."

Shaw remembered one humorous memory of Papaleo: she was assigned to act like an important person in the women studies field.

"November acted like Donna Haraway (a feminist who writes scientific books) and had to talk all tech cyborg," Shaw said. "But when I started to talk in Star Wars language, she didn't know about it."

By taking her school work very seriously yet still having a sense of humor, Shaw described Papaleo as being enthusiastic.

"She goes above and beyond what we ask her to do," Shaw said.

"She is fun, energetic, and vivacious," added Gail Bjorkman, a graduate student in women studies who went with Papaleo to New York and Washington D.C. last summer. "She has a heart of gold."

"She knows a lot about pop culture and how it is relevant to academia," Bjorkman said.

Heather Ebba Maib, a graduate student in women studies, has known Papaleo since she was an undergraduate at Washington State University.

"We go to movies together, coffee shops, and study together," Maib said. "We are like a support network for each other."

When Papaleo is not working hard she takes a break and enjoys fishing.

"I like deep sea fishing," Papaleo said. "I really like to fish for Marlin, but I can't land them because they are too heavy."

Papaleo likes to fish on the Puntochavato run. The fish come out of the water in swells and wranglers dip their nets in and catch them.

"We grill them on the boat," she said.

Although she does like to do other things, women studies is Papaleo's passion.

"She is very committed and passionate," Shaw said.