We Few, We Academic Sisters: How We Persevered and Excelled in Higher Education

Starting in 1967, a time when fewer than 1% of women completed advanced degrees, the Washington State University (WSU) Sociology Department hired three female faculty members who became supportive lifelong friends: Lois B. DeFleur, Sandra Ball-Rokeach, and Marilyn Ihinger-Tallman. Each served as a role model and paved the way for those who followed. Volume editor Betty Houchin Winfield, who in 1979 was a new assistant professor in communications, benefited immensely from their support and encouragement.

Four decades later, Winfield prompted her former mentors to chronicle their past, then gathered their stories. The three women discuss their childhoods, educational and research efforts, personal lives, and career advancements. They note major influences, share what they learned, and acknowledge assistance they received. Though all married professors, they fought to be known as individual scholars, overcoming quotas, nepotism rules, sexual discrimination and harassment, and intense societal pressure to follow traditional female roles.

These trailblazers’ impressive careers parallel larger national events and the onset of increasing opportunities for women. All became full professors when it was exceedingly rare. Dr. DeFleur held positions as dean, provost, and university president. Dr. Ball-Rokeach gained international status as a major media sociologist, and Dr. Ihinger-Tallman became WSU’s first female chair of the sociology department. Their inspiring narratives highlight the importance of community and offer meaningful guidance to current women academics.

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Lois B. Defleur is president emerita, SUNY BInghampton. She served as president at Binghampton from 1990 to 2010. She was dean of Washington State University's College of Humanities and Social Sciences from 1981 to 1986, and directed the NIMH Doctoral Training Program in Deviant Behavior from 1972 to 1979. She was provost at University of Missouri, Columbia, from 1986 to 1990.

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Sandra Ball-Rokeach is professor emerita at the Annenberg School for Communication, and the department of sociology at the University of Southern California (USC). She served as professor of communication and sociology at USC from 1986 to 2019. Prior to that she taught sociology at Washington State University from 1972 to 1986, where she was associate director of the Social Research Center (now SESRC) from 1976 to 1978.

Betty Houchin Winfield, Ph.D., is University of Missouri Curators' Professor Emerita with appointments in the Missouri School of Journalism and the Department of Political Science. Her first job following graduate school was as assistant professor at Washington State University's Murrow School of Communication, where she came into contact with the three women featured in We Few, We Academic Sisters.