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In this interview, Ferrante describes the campus environment for female faculty members of Columbia University in the 1960s, including: the student body, the disparities in pay, the challenges of gaining tenure, and common experiences with the administration. She addresses the different viewpoints between male and female scholarship with a focus on the value of the different approaches to research and inquiry that women have. She discusses her work with and relationship to Carolyn Heilbrun, as well as Heilbrun's significant departure from Columbia University. Ferrante characterizes the English department with particular attention to its shifting power dynamics, hiring processes, decisions in granting tenure, and prevalence of an "old boys' network." She shares her experiences with the Columbia University Senate, the Ad Hoc Faculty Committee, the Ad Hoc Committee on Women and, later, her involvement with IRWGS. She lists some goals of these organizations on campus, including: increased availability of childcare, availability of maternity leave, salary equity, stronger policies against sexual harassment, and measures against discrimination in tenure decisions. Ferrante discusses Columbia College's decision to become a co-educational institution and how she argued for Barnard College to remain as a separate institution. Ferrante also addresses her personal scholarship, including the significance of her book Women as Image in Medieval Literature: From the Twelfth Century to Dante, her translation of The Lais of Marie de France, and her shifting focus within the field of medieval studies. Ferrante both looks to the past to share her knowledge of female mentorship throughout history and towards the future as she addresses the work that still needs to be done.

In this interview, Abu-Lughod describes her time at Williams College, the Institute for Advanced Study, and New York University. Abu-Lughod cites her appointment at Williams—where she attended a reading group with Catharine A. MacKinnon, Adrienne Rich, and Wendy Brown—as her first engagement with women's studies. Abu-Lughod describes the impact this had on her early work,Writing Women's Worlds. Abu-Lughod then discusses her time at the Institute for Advanced Study, where she worked alongside scholars such as Judith Butler, Evelyn Fox Keller, and Donna Haraway. She goes on to summarize her time at New York University, during which she participated in a Ford Foundation Grant effort to internationalize women's studies.