ANTH 3130 The Archaeology of Gender (4 Credits)

This course examines the ways archaeology can contribute to the study of gender through investigations of the deep through recent past. The class will include readings on gender theory, the uses of archaeological data and specific case studies of engendered lives in the past. Cross listed with GWST 3130.

COMN 2210 Gender, Communication, Culture (4 Credits)

This course considers how gender is created, maintained, repaired, and transformed through communication in particular relational, cultural, social, and historical contexts. This course is designed to help students develop thoughtful answers to the following questions: What is gender, how do we acquire it, how do cultural structures and practices normalize and reproduce it, and how do we change and/or maintain it to better serve ourselves and our communities? Throughout the term, we explore how dynamic communicative interactions create, sustain, and subvert femininities and masculinities "from the ground up." This course counts toward the Analytical Inquiry: Society and Culture requirement. Cross listed with GWST 2212.

COMN 3050 Feminism and Intersectionality (4 Credits)

This course offers an overview of feminist theories as they are in dialogue with intersectionality. It offers both a contemporary and historical perspective and is also attentive to the emergence of feminist scholarship in Communication Studies. Cross listed with GWST 3050.

ECON 2280 Gender in the Economy (4 Credits)

This course moves beyond the traditionally male-dominated view of the economy to explore economic life through a gendered lens. A gendered perspective challenges us to see economic theory, markets, work, development, and policy in new ways. Gendered economic analysis expands the focus of economics from strictly wants, scarcity, and choice to include needs, abundance, and social provisioning in its scope. Cross listed with GWST 2280. Prerequisite: ECON 1020.

ENGL 2830 Representations of Women (4 Credits)

Consideration of images presented of and by women in works of English and American literature from Middle Ages to present. Cross listed with GWST 2830.

GWST 1112 Introduction to Gender and Women's Studies (4 Credits)

This course provides an introduction to the discipline of gender and women's studies. All cultures engage in a complex process of assigning cultural values and social roles which vary according to the cultural environment in which human interaction occurs. Among these, the process of translating biological differences into a complex system of gender remains one of the most important. Gender and women's studies aims to understand how this process of 'gendering' occurs, and its larger effects in society. This course also explores how this system of meaning relates to other systems of allocating power, including socioeconomic class, social status, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, and nationality. Using this lens, this course explores contemporary social developments and problems. Gender and women's studies is about studying, but it is also about meaningful engagement with the world. This class presents students with a variety of types of texts from sociological articles to literary fictions and documentary and fictional cinema to explore gender from many different directions. This course counts toward the Scientific Inquiry: Society and Culture requirement.

GWST 2212 Gender, Communication, Culture (4 Credits)

This course considers how gender is created, maintained, repaired, and transformed through communication in particular relational, cultural, social, and historical contexts. This course is designed to help students develop thoughtful answers to the following questions: what is gender, how do we acquire it, how do cultural structures and practices normalize and reproduce it, and how do we change and/or maintain it to better serve ourselves and our communities? Throughout the term, the class explores how dynamic communicative interactions create, sustain, and subvert femininities and masculinities “from the ground up.” This course counts toward the Analytical Inquiry: Society and Culture requirement.This course is cross-listed with COMN 2210.

GWST 2215 Selling Sex, Gender and the American Dream: 1950 - Present (4 Credits)

This introductory course analyzes how commercial culture has evolved into the defining cornerstone of American life over the last sixty years. The first half of the quarter well will examine the key historical movements including the Cold War, the Civil Rights/Women's and Gay Liberation movements and investigate how women, ethnic minorities, and members of the LGBTQ community evolved into important "consumer citizens" in the United States. The second half of the quarter will examine these same social groups from a contemporary perspective, and the degree that globalization, "multiculturalism" and "going green" have emerged as dominant tropes in contemporary culture. By moving from past to present, students will gain an understanding of the complex connections between consumption and U.S. nation-building, as well as the consequences "shopping" and the accumulation of "stuff" has had in both the shaping and reconfiguring understandings of what it means to live the "American Dream." This course counts toward the Analytical Inquiry: Society and Culture requirement.

GWST 2650 Feminist Qualitative Research Methods and Design (4 Credits)

This course will introduce the fundamental elements of feminist qualitative research methods and design. We will begin by examining various research methods, including ethnography, interviews, oral history, media studies/discourse analysis, and community-based research and analyze the ways in which they aid (and help counter) ways of knowing and understanding the social world. In addition to gaining awareness of the more commonly used qualitative and ethnographic methodologies, you will be challenged to think critically about the mechanics, ethics, and politics of such research, including the role of researcher within it. Enrollment restricted to GWST majors only.

GWST 2700 Topics in GWST (1-4 Credits)

Current issues or gender and women's studies faculty research interests.

GWST 2701 Topics in GWST (1-4 Credits)

Current issues or gender and women's studies faculty research interests.

GWST 2730 Gender in Society (4 Credits)

How the biological fact of sex is transformed into socially created gender roles. How individuals learn they are male and female, and how their behaviors are learned. A look at gender distinctions built into language, education, mass media, religion, law, health systems and the workplace. Cross listed with SOCI 2730. Prerequisite: SOCI 1810.

GWST 2981 Colloquium in GWST (2 Credits)

Theme changes each year. May be repeated for credit as long as course titles are different.

GWST 3130 The Archaeology of Gender (4 Credits)

This course examines the ways archaeology can contribute to the study of gender through investigations of the deep through recent past. The class will include readings on gender theory, the uses of archaeological data, and specific case studies of engendered lives in the past. Cross listed with ANTH 3130.

GWST 3652 Culture, Gender and Global Communication (4 Credits)

This course explores the ways in which culture, gender, and communication intersect and shape a variety of issues from an international and intercultural perspective. Using a global feminist perspective, it also focuses on paradigms and paradigm shifts in creating social change. Also explored are alternative paradigms of thought, action and media communications by women and indigenous peoples, which have often been ignored, discounted or buried in history. Cross listed with MFJS 3652.

GWST 3700 Topics in GWST (1-4 Credits)

Current issues or gender and women's studies faculty research interests.

GWST 3701 Topics in GWST (1-4 Credits)

Current issues or gender and women's studies faculty research interests.

GWST 3704 Topics in GWST (1-4 Credits)

Current issues or gender and women's studies faculty research interests.

GWST 3740 Bodies and Souls (4 Credits)

This course examines the unique place of the body in biblical religion. We ask how the Bible and its interpreters have shaped current views on sex and the gendered body in Western society. How has the Bible been (mis) used in relation to current understandings of the physical body? Is the saying that a "human" does not have a body, but is a body as true for the Hebrew Bible as the Christian New Testament? How has Judaism and Christianity (de)valued sexuality, procreation, and celibacy? How do the biblical traditions shape our modern opinions about the ideal physical body and body modifications? How can we understand "out-of-body" experiences and notions of death and afterlife in Western religion? Students are encouraged to interpret the Bible and their own beliefs from a uniquely embodied perspective. Cross listed with JUST 3740, RLGS 3740.

GWST 3950 Feminist, Gender, and Queer Theory (4 Credits)

This course examines the major theoretical approaches (feminist, womanist, queer, etc.) to understanding gender and other intersecting systems of oppression and privilege. It explores the historical evolution of the theoretical traditions that have informed feminism, queer theory, and gender and women's studies, as well as examining more recent developments within these fields of inquiry. Students apply these theories to a range of texts, empirical data and/or the experiential world. This course may be repeated for credit as long as course subtitles are different. Prerequisite: GWST 1112; minimum of junior standing.

GWST 3975 Capstone Seminar (4 Credits)

This course provides students the opportunity to complete a substantial final project for their degree in gender and women’s studies, which may take the form of preparation for a thesis, community-based research or service project, or a substantial creative or research project. Students work closely with the director of the program or a faculty member affiliated with the program to devise these projects after spending the first part of the course exploring recent research within the field of gender and women’s studies. Prerequisites: GWST major or minor, GWST 1112, GWST 3950, senior standing, or permission of instructor.

GWST 3985 GWST Internship (2-5 Credits)

GWST 3991 Independent Study (1-10 Credits)

GWST 3995 Independent Research (1-10 Credits)

GWST 3998 Honors Thesis (1-5 Credits)

HIST 2630 American Women's History (4 Credits)

This course is a survey of U.S. women's history from the colonial period to the present. It examines the social, cultural, economic, and political developments shaping American women's public and private roles over several centuries, in addition to the ways in which women gave meaning to their everyday lives. Particular attention is paid to the variety of women's experiences, with an emphasis on the interplay of race, class, ethnicity, and sexuality. Cross listed with GWST 2630.

INTS 2235 Gender and International Relations (4 Credits)

How does gender shape international relations (IR)? How do ideas about masculinity and femininity affect war and peace? The global economy? Migration? Foreign policy? What do feminist perspectives contribute to the study of IR? These questions have relevance for the academic study of IR as well as the lived experiences of people around the world. Answering them requires attending to the ways in which gender and aspects of sexuality are constructed through social and political relations, and the hierarchies of power they reflect and maintain. Overall, this course encourages students to grapple with the issue of if and how gender matters in international relations. We will begin by introducing the concepts and theories necessary to investigate, research, analyze, and understand the gendered nature of international relations. Next, we will use this knowledge to compare gendered and feminist perspectives on IR to mainstream IR and explore why they have not been fully integrated. Then we will engage in gendered analyses of a variety of topics in IR, focusing especially on security and the economy. We will finish by carrying out research on a topic of our choosing, using the lenses and tools we have developed. In the end, students should consider whether this sort of perspective provides a more nuanced and holistic way of understanding IR.

JUST 2430 Hidden Figures: Religion and Gender in the Ancient Mediterranean World (4 Credits)

Much of what survives from the religions of the ancient Mediterranean—texts, inscriptions, artwork, and ritual objects—was created by elite men and for male audiences. How, then, can we understand the lives and experiences of women in antiquity? This course investigates that question by examining how gender, social hierarchy, and sexuality shaped religious identities across the ancient Mediterranean within Jewish, Christian, Greek, and Roman religious traditions. Drawing on diverse methods from history, feminist and queer theory, archaeology, and literary studies, we will analyze both ancient evidence and modern interpretive frameworks. Students will explore depictions of women in Jewish, Christian, Greek, and Roman texts; consider the gaps and ambiguities in our sources; and reflect on how gendered assumptions influence scholarship today. Spanning the Hellenistic period through late antiquity, the course invites students to rethink what counts as evidence and to practice reconstructing women’s religious lives—both what can be known and how we come to know it.

MFJS 3242 Reel Women (4 Credits)

Reel Women explores films from the U.S., England, Senegal, India, Canada, Colombia, and Saudi Arabia that are made for, about, and/or by women with the aim of better understanding and centralizing issues pertinent to women’s daily lives across the world.

MFJS 3652 Feminist Media Studies (4 Credits)

MFJS 3652 (Feminist Media Studies) explores the gendered intersections between media and society through the analytical lens of Feminist Media Studies (FMS). While aligned with the discipline Media Studies, FMS centers questions related to power and patriarchy, and aims to create space for praxis. Paying close attention to issues of intersectionality, this course surveys the historical emergence, and contributions, of feminist methodology and inquiry related to issues such as sexism within gaming, the politics of visibility in television production, the celluloid ceiling, and networked bodies. During the quarter, you will engage in multiple points of active and reflective learning that provide the space to strengthen both your understanding and application of FMS. Assignments include discussion questions, self-reflective analysis, and a final project that highlights application, creativity, and subversion.

PHIL 2186 Feminist Ethics: Justice and Care (4 Credits)

In the late 1950’s psychologists began to theorize a notion of human moral development and they created instruments with which to measure such development. By the 1970’s there were claims that even well-educated women were—on average—stunted in their moral competence according to these measures. Once a sufficient number of women were engaged in moral theory in both psychology and philosophy, they began to diagnose these theories and instruments as prejudiced by what we would today call ‘while, cisgender, male privilege.’ The scales were centering a detached notion of justice and equality for all, whereas researchers found that women centered notions of care and engaged in relational (rather than detached) thinking when asked ethical questions. Thus, was born the discipline of Feminist Ethics. While many women (and some men) celebrated the alternative ‘ethics of care’ over an ‘ethics of justice,’ others worried that these women had been harmed by their male dominated society and were showing signs of a ‘slave mentality’ in their moral reasoning that was to be overcome and not celebrated. Predictably (in hindsight), women of color complained that their perspective was not taken into account by these ‘caring’ white female professors. In this class we will look at this conversation as it unfolded. In the process we will evaluate these theories from a philosophical perspective and see which parts seem most helpful for thinking about current ethical issues. Many or all of the readings were probably written before you were born. In fact, there is very little philosophical literature that labels itself ‘feminist ethics’ or ‘ethics of care’ that was written in the 21st century. We will ponder why this is the case. Are these ideas outdated, or have they been sufficiently incorporated into mainstream academic thinking that they no longer wear the label of marginalization? This course counts toward the Analytical Inquiry: Society and Culture requirement.

PLSC 2020 Politics of Desire (4 Credits)

This course surveys political theory literatures on the topic of desire—with a focus on sexuality. Readings will survey historical and contemporary theories of relationships, sexual identity, and power, and topics will include the relationships between ideas about desires and ideas about bodies, needs, and preferences. We will think about desire as it manifests in our individual and collective lives, such as its relationship with race, gender, aesthetics, and freedom. We will especially tackle the problem of how to transcend affinities for hierarchy and distinction and in their place generate desires for democratic equality.

PLSC 2360 Settler Colonialism and Indigenous Resistance in Three Continents (4 Credits)

This course explores historical and contemporary aspects of racialized power structures as they have specifically impacted indigenous peoples in Australia, the United States, and Latin America. How did the dynamics of imperialism, capitalism, liberal state-building, and racialist (and racist) ideology combine to devastate indigenous communities around the world? How did distinct perspectives on time, space, property, and community allow colonizing populations to conquer native populations even while advocating the most egalitarian political structures ever attempted? Satisfies department distribution requirement in comparative/international politics. Sophomore standing required.

PLSC 2503 Women, Gender, and Law (4 Credits)

How have U.S. courts understood women and gender both historically and today? This course will begin with questions about who “counts” as a woman and how different groups of women have been treated by our legal system. We’ll then examine topics such as economic rights, access to academics and athletics, domestic violence, and reproductive rights through an examination of court cases and secondary sources. Students will have the opportunity to analyze these topics through varied theoretical lenses such as substantive versus formal equality, autonomy, and non-subordination.

PLSC 2510 Women in U.S. Politics (4 Credits)

This course focuses on the role of women in U.S. politics, with an emphasis on voting, elections, and representation. Topics include the woman suffrage movement, women’s voting patterns, women as candidates, and women holding elected office. Prerequisite: sophomore standing.

PLSC 2660 Feminist Political Thought (4 Credits)

This course surveys political theory literatures on feminist thinking and activism. Readings will survey historical and contemporary theories of gender, identity, patriarchy, misogyny, and liberation. Course will center trans and of-color feminist narratives thinking and practices. Emphasis on critical analysis of various feminist texts in writing and in class discussion.

RLGS 3740 Bodies and Souls (4 Credits)

This course examines the unique place of the body in biblical religion. We ask how the Bible and its interpreters have shaped current views on sex and the gendered body in Western society. How has the Bible been (mis)used in relation to current understandings of the physical body? Is the saying that a "human" does not have a body, but is a body as true for the Hebrew Bible as the Christian New Testament? How have Judaism and Christianity (de)valued sexuality, procreation, and celibacy? How do the biblical traditions shape our modern opinions about the ideal physical body and body modifications? How can we understand "out-of-body" experiences and notions of death and afterlife in Western religion? Students are encouraged to interpret the Bible and their own beliefs from a uniquely embodied perspective. Cross listed with GWST 3740, JUST 3740.

SOCI 2210 The Family (4 Credits)

Emphasis on different kinds of families and on contemporary issues of changing gender roles, intimacy, childbearing, family breakup and reconstitution, and family's relationships with other social institutions. Cross listed with GWST 2210. Prerequisite: SOCI 1810 or permission of instructor.

SOCI 2420 Social Inequality (4 Credits)

Dimensions of social class and its effect on economic, political and social institutions as well as style of life. Cross listed with GWST 2420. Prerequisite: SOCI 1810 and sophomore standing or permission of instructor.

SOCI 2565 Men and Masculinities (4 Credits)

Many of us believe that anatomy is what determines our behavior and that our bodies dictate our social and psychological temperament. Looking specifically at men and masculinities, this course tests that general notion, investigates the various ways male behavior is gendered and critically explores the meanings of masculinity in contemporary institutions. Throughout the course, we look at the multidimensional and multicultural ways masculinity is produced, constructed, enacted, and resisted; how masculinities structure power and resources; and how masculinities benefit, regulate, and hurt men's lives. Cross listed with GWST 2565. Prerequisite: SOCI 1810 or permission of instructor.

SOCI 2730 Gender in Society (4 Credits)

How the biological fact of sex is transformed into socially created gender roles. How individuals learn they are male and female, and how their behaviors are learned. A look at gender distinctions built into language, education, mass media, religion, law, health systems and the workplace. Cross listed with GWST 2730. Prerequisite: SOCI 1810 or permission of instructor.

SOCI 2765 The Female Offender (4 Credits)

Female offenders are one of the fastest growing segments in both the juvenile and adult justice systems. This course introduces students to debates and issues surrounding girls, women, and crime; explores different theoretical perspectives of gender and crime; and examines the impact of gender on the construction and treatment of female offenders by the justice system. In addition, this course specifically looks at girls' and women's pathways to offending and incarcerations; understanding girls' violence in the inner city; exploring the reality of prison life for women, with a particular focus on the gender-sensitive programming for incarcerated mothers; and ending with an examination of how capital punishment has affected women offenders historically and contemporarily. Cross listed with GWST 2765. Prerequisite: SOCI 1810 or permission of instructor.

SOCI 2780 Women and the Law (4 Credits)

This course explores the relationship between women and the law, looking at the way the categories of sex and gender have been produced and re-produced through law. Through a look at case law and sociological research, students will examine women as bodies, workers and family members. This course also explores the development and current status of American law in the areas of women's constitutional equality, pay equity and equal opportunity, women's access to education, women in the workplace and violence against women. Cross listed with GWST 2780. Prerequisite: SOCI 1810 or permission of the instructor.

SPAN 3510 Sex, Bodies, and Power in Imperial Spain (4 Credits)

This course considers the body a key locus of social and political struggle in the 16th and 17th Centuries in Spain and in the Indies. Contemplating the role of a variety of discourses from diverse fields (medicine, law, philosophy, theology, politics), we will ask such questions as: What is the body and how does it work in physical terms? How is the body used to perform or problematize legal, moral, and social identities? How is the body used as a mechanism to marginalize, control, or exclude individuals or groups, or to legitimize the authority and power of other individuals or groups? We will contemplate representations of the body in diverse media and genres (painting, sculpture, engravings, theater, novels, poetry, autobiography, medical treatises, moralizing tracts) in order to reconstruct the complex epistemology through which the body, and especially problems of race, gender, and sexuality, was conceptualized in the 16th and 17th Centuries. Particular attention will be paid to the representation of the materiality of the body (physiology as a key to moral and cultural difference), eroticism and desire, cross-dressing, ‘monsters,’ sickness, and reproduction, considering the representation of such corporeal phenomena to be a privileged space for interrogating the ideologies and structures upon which Power is built. Prerequisites: SPAN 2300, SPAN 2350, SPAN 2400 or equivalent.