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While scholarly efforts have helped promote an investigation into women’s leadership, dominant, male-centered paradigms and methods have presented a limited and marginalizing view of the complex ways in which women lead and engage in relationships. In this book, we focus on women as influential community leaders. Keeping the Fire is not merely a metaphor, it is a call to honor the enduring flame of women’s work and leadership, and let its warmth guide us toward more just, whole, and connected futures.
Within the chapters, authors illustrate how women use their agency, identify and address community needs, and understand relationality as an organic evolution of leadership. Part 1 is divided into three sections: Sparks from the Past; Identity and Communityship; and Connection and Belonging, presenting contributions from and about women who represent different cultures, races, and experiences, and use paradigms and methods that honor the multiple ways of knowing about and leading communally as women. Stories, narratives, and portraits explore the women who inspire, influence, and ultimately transform their communities.
Lazarina N. Topuzova, PhD is a Professor of Organizational Leadership at Robert Morris University. Her research expertise is in developing leadership capacity in community and grassroots organizations, leadership for peace, and women in leadership.
Kem Gambrell, PhD is an Anglo scholar and educator serving as professor and chair of Gonzaga University’s Doctoral Program in Leadership Studies. Her work explores women, constructive development, compassion, Indigenous perspectives, and decolonization in leadership and communityship.
Sydney D. Richardson, PhD is an Associate Professor of Leadership Studies at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. Her research intersects community leadership development and leader identity with marginalized entrepreneurs.
Introduction; Lazarina N. Topuzova, Kem Gambrell, and Sydney D. Richardson
PART I. SPARKS FROM THE PAST
Chapter 1. A Phenomenology of Fire: On the Invisible Power of Women in Irish Society; Róisín Lally
Chapter 2. The Maggie Walker “Circle”: Black Female Leadership in Richmond’s Jackson Ward Community, 1880-1935, and a Diverse Galaxy of Individual Talents; Raymond Pierre Hylton and Kimberly A. Matthews
Chapter 3. Building Community through Community Leadership: Charlotte Hawkins Brown and The Palmer Institute; Sydney D. Richardson
Chapter 4. Holding the Line: The Women in the Arizona Miners’ Strike of 1983-1986; Lazarina Topuzova and Anna Ochoa O'Leary
PART II. INTERSECTION OF IDENTITY AND COMMUNITYSHIP
Chapter 5. Diasporic Leadership and Relational Dynamics of Women Descendants of Genocide and Displacement; Liane Weintraub and Karin Moore
Chapter 6. Life History through an Intersectional Lens: Exploring a Woman’s Narrative of Community Leadership in the Greek Diaspora of Australia; Nicola Sum and Maria Gindidis
Chapter 7. I Hold My Head High: Caste Mindset versus Dignity in the Relational Leadership of Mrs. Krishnaveni Poyyamani; Manojprabhakaran Thirupal and Katherine Thirupal
Chapter 8. Muslim Women in Modern Times: Grassroots Leadership, Entrepreneurship, and Social Reform; Aasiyah N. Ghazi
PART III. CONNECTION AND BELONGING
Chapter 9. Centering Black Women’s Voices: Leadership at the Intersection of Identity and Community; LaSchanda Johnson
Chapter 10. The Heart of Hearth: Women Leaders Crafting Spaces of Connection and Belonging; Molly Ayers
Chapter 11. Hubs of Convergence: A Nelson Mandela University Case study in Equalizing Engagement between a University and its Community; Sibongile Muthwa
Chapter 12. Beyond the Mastermind: Cultivating Connection and Community Leadership through an Ever- Evolving Community of Practice; Dorine Lawrence-Hughes, Chrys Egan, Martinella Dryburgh, Pelin Kohn, and Lori Peters