For the third time in since 1994, Associate Professor of Political Science Leslie Hill visited South Africa last winter to investigate how the dynamics of a state in transition affect women's political lives.

"Six years after the installation of South Africa's first nonracist government and four years after the ratification of a new constitution which bans gender discrimination, I got a chance to find out if and how those agendas are progressing. It was fascinating," said Hill, who interviewed female activists and members of parliament in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Capetown and Durban. Hill received an inaugural 1999–2000 Phillips Faculty Fellowship as part of a $9 million endowment bequest from former Bates President Charles F. Phillips and his wife.

Hill also found her trip provocative as a teacher, opening the door to new approaches in the classroom. Her upper level courses, such as "Gender and the State," include students from a variety of disciplines. "It's exciting," she says, "because they think differently and enrich the work we are able to do in class." Hill finds Bates students "interested and intellectually curious. They're willing to stay with a topic that's unfamiliar and leads them to question assumptions. It's healthy to engage in a process of discovery."

Interdisciplinary approaches provide Bates with another way to grow in the future, Hill said. She uses philosophy, anthropology, history, sociology and literature to support her teaching and scholarship in political science. As acting chair of interdisciplinary studies and chair of women's studies beginning in winter 2001, Hill appreciates the "tremendous amount of energy and insight displayed by Bates faculty and students who are willing to integrate the methods of inquiry from various disciplines to pursue their research."