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Across this four-session interview, Alice Kessler-Harris discusses her research and early career which emerged from the women's movement of the 1970s. Kessler-Harris discusses her role as a lead witness in the 1986 case brought against Sears, Roebuck and Company for gender discrimination, and her related 1990 publication A Woman's Wage. Kessler-Harris talks about the beginnings of her academic career, including her experiences teaching at Rutgers University, Sarah Lawrence College, and Hofstra University. She also discusses the guidance she received from Rutgers historian Warren Sussman and her work with District 65 of the United Automobile Workers union before accepting a position at Columbia University. Kessler-Harris discusses the introduction of gender as a category of analysis in the 1990s and, upon her arrival at Columbia, the transition within the women's studies department from activist scholarship to public intellectualism, and the increasingly post-structural, theoretical direction of women's studies. Additionally, Kessler-Harris describes what she sees as a decline in student activism while also acknowledging the role of students in helping her create safe spaces for transgender students. Furthermore, Kessler-Harris discusses her program "Social Justice After the Welfare State" at the Center for the Study of Social Difference, and the role of intersectionality in the future of IRWGS.

In this interview, Barry reflects on her arrival at Columbia University in 1985. She begins by describing her upbringing in Butler, New Jersey, citing the challenges of being one of nine children and a student in an overcrowded small town high school. Barry goes on to describe her time at Gettysburg College and her pursuit of a Master's degree in history at Columbia. Barry reflects on her decision to move to New York. She shares her experience of coming out and her subsequent encounters with homophobia. Barry characterizes her participation in IRWGS and recalls her efforts in GABLES, the Gay, Bisexual, and Lesbian Employees and Supporters group, which existed from 1993-1997 and arose to combat the inaccessibility to married housing, health benefits, and life insurance for queer couples at the University. Barry describes the limitations of GABLES in a larger discussion of the long and difficult process by which queer women, transgender, and LGBTQ people of color struggled at the University.

In the first session of this interview, Barbara Simon talks about her early involvement with the newly-established IRWGS upon her arrival at Columbia University in 1986. Simon talks at length about how IRWGS became a significant part of her scholarship at Columbia. At IRWGS, Simon says, she found scholars with similar ideas, gave a book talk after the publication of her first book Never Married Women, and participated in a grant-funded faculty seminar on intersectionality in feminism that continued to inform her work at the time of the interview. Simon also addresses the current state of IRWGS, applauding the institute for becoming more interdisciplinary and theoretically sophisticated, and for adding 'sexuality' to its name. Simon talks about the necessity of studying both gender and sexuality. Simon discusses how she was drawn to the Columbia University School of Social Work (CSSW) and the challenges she has faced as a qualitative researcher, ethnographer, feminist scholar, activist, and an openly gay woman. Simon puts emphasis on the challenges which still remained at the time of the interview, including circumstances which make it very difficult for scholars to teach interdisciplinarily at centers like IRWGS. In the second session of this interview, Simon offers advice, imagines the possible future of IRWGS, and notes the continuing problems for feminism on Columbia's campus and elsewhere. Additionally, Simon addresses the administration's response to issues of sexual assault on campus and the relationship between IRWGS and Barnard College.

In the first session of this interview, Christia Mercer discusses her PhD program at Princeton University and the campus's intellectual environment for women, many of whom experienced "imposter syndrome" at the time. After being hired by Columbia University, Mercer found a mentor outside of the Philosophy Department in Jean Howard and subsequently started teaching at IRWGS. She addresses her approach to teaching the IRWGS seminar Feminist Texts I. Mercer also returns to earlier memories to recall the culture growing up in Texas and the gender roles she observed there.

In this interview, Ellen MacKay discusses her early life including her high school studies, her undergraduate years at Barnard College, and her appreciation of the theater—all of which helped direct her course of study. MacKay details her most influential courses and instructors, including an undergraduate Feminist Text course with Ellen Chesler and a graduate course on early modern theater with Jean Howard, which led to her personal pursuit of a greater knowledge of history, literary criticism, and feminist theory. Jean Howard, along with Julie Crawford and Rachel Adams, became both a mentor and role model for MacKay and led her to pursue a graduate certificate at IRWGS. MacKay discusses the inspiration and guidance she received under these women and others. Additionally, MacKay addresses the influence IRWGS's Feminist Pedagogy workshop had on her career.

In this interview, Eric Foner describes his experience at Columbia University, first as a student and later as a faculty member. He begins with a description of Columbia at the time of his undergraduate and graduate years, from 1959 to 1969. Foner discusses the state of the history department during this period. After his return to Columbia in 1982, Foner describes the arrival of Professor Elizabeth Blackmar, the first female history professor at Columbia. Foner recalls early conversations with Blackmar regarding the integration of women's studies into the history curriculum and names Blackmar as the crucial connection between history and IRWGS. Foner locates these goals within a larger shift at Columbia, citing the inclusion of female undergraduates in 1983. Foner continues to see institutes such as IRWGS, the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity, and the Institute for Research in African-American Studies as crucial agents in diversifying Columbia's intellectual community.

In this interview, Farah Griffin begins by discussing her early life in South Philadelphia, her love of reading, her relationship with her father and how he was impacted by racial prejudice, the demographics of her neighborhood, and her personal study of women's history and black history. She talks about her early education at an integrated Philadelphia magnet school and the Baldwin School. She goes on to address the origins of her admiration for Toni Morrison, her decision to attend Harvard University as an undergraduate, and her mentors at Harvard: Nathan Huggins and Werner Sollors. Griffin talks about her intellectual interests, including Black feminism, Black feminist literary studies, jazz studies, gender and sexuality, and literature. Griffin discusses her PhD program in American Studies at Yale and cites the classes and professors that influenced her. She briefly addresses her time at the University of Pennsylvania and her own activist work. She characterizes the climate of the English department when she arrived at Columbia and how she was immediately embraced by IRWGS and by the Institute for Research in African-American Studies (IRAAS). Griffin talks about her mentorship with Jean Howard and her involvement in diversity initiatives. She discusses her bookHarlem Nocturne, novelist Ann Petry, and her work spreading black women's intellectual history. Griffin concludes the interview by reflecting on how the student body has changed during her time at Columbia. She specifically addresses generational differences between herself and her students, especially regarding the election of President Barack Obama, the backlash after his election, the shooting of Trayvon Martin, the protests in Ferguson, Missouri, the Black Lives Matter movement, and anti-sexual violence activism on campus.

In this interview, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak discusses her decision to come teach at Columbia University, drawn by New York City, her friend and colleague Palestinian literary theoretician Edward Said, and IRWGS. Spivak shares the topics she explored at IRWGS—feminism and psychoanalysis, global feminism, feminism and de-colonization—and her role in the foundation of Columbia's Institute for Comparative Literature and Society. Spivak discusses the nature of the discipline of comparative literature and its relationship to other departments. Spivak goes on to talk about gender studies and the climate for feminism at other institutions, including: the University of Pittsburgh, Emory University, University of Texas Austin, University of Iowa, and Cornell University. Spivak also discusses feminism in her childhood and her unconventional upbringing in India. Spivak addresses tokenism and the challenges of being a female professor of color. She also talks about her Rural Education Project, her activism, her mother's activism, and being inspired by Malcolm X.