Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (WGSS)

WGSS 1999. Tutorial. (1 Credit)

Independent research and reading with supervision from a faculty member.

WGSS 2999. Tutorial. (2 Credits)

Independent research and reading with supervision from a faculty member.

WGSS 3000. Gender and Sexuality Studies. (4 Credits)

This course introduces students to theories of gender and sexuality from a range of disciplinary perspectives. It is the new introductory course for the WGSS program. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ACUP, ADVD, AMST, APPI, ASHS, ASSC, BIOE, COLI, INST, ISIN, PJGS, PJST.

WGSS 3001. Queer Theories. (4 Credits)

An introduction to the academic discipline of queer theory, focusing on foundational thinkers (e.g., Butler, Foucault, Sedgwick, and others as well as their philosophical and psychoanalytic precursors and interlocutors. The course will also address selected issues currently under discussion in the discipline. These may include the role of activism, the relationship between queer theory and feminism theory, attention to race, and intersections with postcolonial theory. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ACUP, ADVD, AMST, ASAM, ASHS, ASLT, CCUS, COLI, INST, ISIN, PJGS, PJST, PLUR.

WGSS 3002. Feminist and Women's Studies. (4 Credits)

This course provides a historical perspective on feminism and women’s experience, including 19th and 20th century American movements for women’s rights as well as texts that influenced the development of feminist thought and theory. It is one of three required courses for WGSS program. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ADVD, AMST, ASHS, HIAH, HIST, HIUL, PJGS, PJST.

WGSS 3004. Transnational Feminisms. (4 Credits)

Transnational feminism first emerged as a critical response to global feminist platforms organized around notions of universal sisterhood and the presumption of women's shared oppression. This course considers how the field of transnational feminist scholarship has expanded to engage a wide range of topics pertaining to modern forms of state power, including critical studies of economic restructuring, settler colonial rule, human rights, global carceral regimes, and the criminalization of borders. Throughout, the class will emphasize how a transnational perspective unsettles U.S.-centric approaches to feminism and engages with local struggles as intimately shaped by colonial histories and transnational processes. With these critical tools in place, we will work to imagine possibilities for building feminist alliances across borders and practicing decolonizing forms of solidarity. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: AMST, ANTH, APPI, ASHS, ASSC, ENGL, HCWL, INST, ISIN.

WGSS 3067. Contemporary Women Poets. (4 Credits)

In this course, students will read poetry written by women poets in the 20th and 21st centuries with a focus on the imaginative representation of women's lived experience. We will read the work of poets who address the themes of feminine embodiment and sexuality, women's roles as mothers and daughters, women's work (both professional and domestic), and the role poetry plays in enabling women to discover a language to contain their experience. Among the (possible) poets we will read are Sylvial Plath, Ann Sexton, Elizabeth Bishop, Lucille Clifton, Anna Swir, Adrienne Rich, Marie Ponsot, Eavan Boland, Louise Erdrich, Kate Daniels, Mary Karr and A.E. Stallings. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ALC, ENRJ, IRST, PJGS, PJST.

WGSS 3141. Women in Africa. (4 Credits)

This course examines the formal and informal participation of African women in politics, their interaction with the state and their role in society. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: AFAM, ASSC, GLBL, INST, ISAF, ISIN.

WGSS 3318. Early Women Novelists. (4 Credits)

This course examines the rise of female novelists in early modern England. We focus on women’s novels because they were—and still are—too often neglected. At the same time, though, we need to think critically about the problems of organizing a course around the authors’ sex. Indeed, we need to think critically about the categorical assumptions raised by this course’s very title. Above all, our goal is to develop rigorous, historically sensitive, close readings of each novel, focusing especially on problems of slavery, race, gender, and class. Note: Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ALC, ENGL, ENHD, PJGS.

WGSS 3415. European Women 1500-1800. (4 Credits)

This course will explore the role of women in northern European society from the 16th to the end of the 18th centuries. It will examine issues of gender, and contemporary attitudes concerning women. Among the subjects that this course will address are women's work, education, marriage and childbirth. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attribute: AHC.

WGSS 3416. European Women 1800-Present. (4 Credits)

This course will be an exciting exploration of the changing status, roles, and achievements of women in Western Europe from the French Revolution at the dawn of industrialization to the present day. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: AHC, HIST, INST, IPE, ISEU.

WGSS 3459. Transgender History. (4 Credits)

This course examines the making of transgender life in the modern world. We will begin in late 19th-century Europe with the emergence of sexology, contextualizing early sexological writings in relation to contemporaneous cultures of sexual and gender nonconformity, to literary and historiographical works in which gender-variant figures appear, and to the gender dynamics of high imperialism. In this way, we will sketch out the historical matrix that gave birth to the modern invert. We will treat transgender people not only as objects of historical narratives but also as creators of historical representations. We will engage with late 20th- and early 21st-century histories of transgender life in various places, including Europe, the United States, and other areas of the world.

Attributes: AHC, INST, ISIN.

WGSS 3503. Work, Family, and Gender. (4 Credits)

This course examines how two key institutions in society – the workplace and the family – interact with one another. Special emphasis is placed on the critical ways that work-family balance and conflict are conditioned by gender. The course will cover the impacts – both negative and positive – of work demands upon individuals’ family lives, as well as the effects of family obligations upon workers and workplaces. Students will be familiarized with voluntary responses to work-family challenges on the part of individuals, families, and employers, as well as relevant public policies in the U.S. and around the world. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attribute: AMST.

WGSS 3537. Satire, Sex, Style: Age of T. Nash. (4 Credits)

Considered for a long time to be a "minor" Elizabethan writer with "nothing to say," Thomas Nashe managed to produce a varied and astonishing, if ultimately costly and futile, body of work during the last decade of the sixteenth century, spanning erotica, picaresque fiction, and fierce invective, satire, and polemic. This course will offer a close look at Nashe's unique rhetorical style in relation to the vivid literary culture of his times, focusing on how Nashe's work pushes to the extreme various impulses in Elizabethan literature that tend to get overlooked in conventional accounts of the period. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attribute: ALC.

WGSS 3826. Modern US Women's History. (4 Credits)

The history of American women from the first women's rights convention in 1848 to the present. We will study women's everyday lives (including at home and work), major events like the campaign for suffrage, World War II, and the women's liberation movement, and representations of women in popular culture (magazines, movies, and T.V.). Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ACUP, AHC, AMST, APPI, ASHS, PLUR.

WGSS 3901. Philosophical Issues Feminism I. (4 Credits)

Philosophical exploration of issues raised by historical and contemporary reflection on the relationship between the sexes. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

WGSS 3930. Sex and Gender in South Asia. (4 Credits)

In this course, we will explore histories of women, gender, and sexuality in South Asia from the 18th century to the present. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: AHC, GLBL.

WGSS 3931. Introduction to Gay and Lesbian Literature. (4 Credits)

This course will read texts by a diverse range of Anglophone authors, emphasizing the cultural history of same-sex identity and desire, heteronormativity and oppression, and queer civil protest. It will also consider the problems of defining a queer literary canon, introduce the principles of queer theory, and interrogate the discursive boundaries between the political and personal. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ALC, AMST.

WGSS 3999. Tutorial. (3 Credits)

Independent research and reading with supervision from a faculty member.

WGSS 4005. Queer Theory and the Americas. (4 Credits)

Drawing from the often divergent traditions of Anglo and Hispanic America, this course will take an interdisciplinary approach to queer methodologies for cultural and literary studies. Students will encounter foundational queer theoretical texts (both historical and contemporary) as well as novels, plays, and films, and will explore, for themselves, what queerness means and does. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ACUP, ADVD, AMST, ASHS, COLI, ENGL, ICC.

WGSS 4105. Religion, Gender, and Sexuality. (4 Credits)

This course considers the intersections of religion, gender, and sexuality. In many parts of the world, including the United States, and in many religious traditions, cultural and religious identity and continuity hinge on gendered practices and closely controlled sexual regimes. The goal of this course is to understand how religious institutions, communities, doctrines, practices and traditions shape gendered ideologies and practices, debates about sexuality and gendered division of labor, and the lives of men and women who participate in these religious communities. The course is organized conceptually; rather than learning about specific religious traditions, we will discuss thematic issues at the intersection of religion, gender, and sexuality. At various junctures we will discuss specific examples that span religious traditions, geographical locations, and historical periods. The course will therefore provide students with a sense of how contemporary and seemingly local debates are rooted in much broader conversations. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ADVD, AMST, ASHS, ASRP, ICC, PLUR, REST.

WGSS 4127. Seminar: Novels By Women: Jane Austen to Toni Morrison. (4 Credits)

An intensive study of novels by Jane Austen, George Elliot, Virginia Woolf, Zora Neale Hurston, and Toni Morrison. Our reading will be supplemented by literary criticism and historical contextual material. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ALC, ENGL.

WGSS 4318. Seminar: Early Women Novelists. (4 Credits)

A study of the rise of female authors in eighteenth-century England. We will address problems of gender, race and class, as well as the basic literary and historical dimensions of each text we read. Authors will likely include Aphra Behn, Eliza Haywood, Frances Burney, Mary Wollstonecraft, Ann Radcliffe, Jane Austen, and Charlotte or Emily Brontë. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attribute: ALC.

WGSS 4341. Race, Sex, and Science. (4 Credits)

This course introduces students to interdisciplinary debates about the relationship between race, sex, and gender, on the one hand, and science, technology, and medicine, on the other. We will examine two interrelated questions: How do scientific claims influence cultural understandings of race, gender, and sexuality; and how do cultural beliefs about race, sex, and gender influence scientific research and knowledge production? The course will explore the role that understandings of race, sex, and gender have played in the development of Western science; the relationship among race, sex, gender, and scientific research in genomics and health disparities research (among other fields); and finally, the ways in which race, gender, and social inequalities become embodied and affect human biology. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: AMST, ICC, LALS, PLUR, SOCI, URST.

WGSS 4344. Reproductive Technologies: Global Perspective. (4 Credits)

The interdisciplinary course will focus on issues in technology and reproduction, emphasizing the view that reproduction is not simply a biological process, but one that is laden with symbolic, political, and ideological meanings. Drawing on the fields of anthropology, sociology, history, public health, law, and science, technology and society. We will examine the contested meanings of reproduction, in particular how reproductive technologies are changing lives around the globe. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: GLBL, ICC.

WGSS 4400. Gender, Bodies, and Sexuality. (4 Credits)

This course explores how gender and sex shape our lives and the world around us, our experiences of our bodies, and definitions of sexuality. Our focus will be on gender/sexuality as key dimensions of all social structures and institutions, with a particular interest in the intersection between gender and sexuality and the shaping of gendered and sexed bodies. We will examine gender, sex, and sexuality as social constructions, as social relations, as contested sets of cultural meanings, as lived experiences, and as dimensions of social structure. We will discuss challenges to and fissures in the sex/gender/sexuality system. Course materials include theoretical writings, empirical studies, autobiographical reflections, and films. These materials will inspire us to consider the social, economic, cultural, and institutional forces that shape our lives. Students will develop a critical perspective on the sources and consequences of social constructs and inequalities that shape us as individuals, our culture, and the social institutions that we inhabit, such as schools, the workplace, the state, and the family. This includes a critical evaluation of widespread assumptions about gender that we often take for granted, such as the naturalness of categories of “man” and “woman,” “femininity” and “masculinity,” and “heterosexual” and “homosexual.” Note: Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ADVD, AMST, ASHS, COLI, ICC, PJGS, PJST, PLUR, SOCI.

WGSS 4800. Internship. (4 Credits)

Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

WGSS 4888. Summer Research/Project/Internship. (4 Credits)

This course is designed with three possible models in mind: 1) students looking to get their research started for the WGSS required senior project, thesis, or internship, in conjunction with an advisor; 2) students looking to complete that research, whether for a thesis, project, or internship during the summer months; 3) students who would like to do a directed independent project in the summer, for WGSS credit.

WGSS 4910. Internship. (4 Credits)

Placement in an agency or organization that deals with women's issues. Under a faculty member's supervision, the student writes a paper which integrates the internship experience with course work and research. All students meet monthly with the program co-director and one another for group discussions of their work. *This course requires the approval of the Director of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

WGSS 4920. Senior Project. (4 Credits)

A substantial project on a subject in Women's Studies submitted, with appropriate documentation, by students in theatre and the visual arts and evaluated by two faculty advisers in their field. All students meet monthly with the program co-director and one another for group discussions of their work. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Prerequisites: WGSS 3000 (may be taken concurrently) and WGSS 3002 (may be taken concurrently).

WGSS 4930. Senior Thesis. (4 Credits)

A substantial paper on a topic in Women's Studies written under the direction of a faculty adviser and a second reader. All students meet monthly with the program co-director and one another for group discussions of their work. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Prerequisites: WGSS 3000 (may be taken concurrently) and WGSS 3002 (may be taken concurrently).

WGSS 4950. Christianity and Sexual Diversity. (4 Credits)

Employing perspectives from history, theological ethics, and LGBT studies, this course will investigate what it means to take queer perspectives on Christianity sexuality, and discipleship. Readings will include biblical, historical, and contemporary materials that seek to illuminate the ways in which Christians and Christian communities have responded to sexual and gender diversity. Four-credit courses that meet for 150 minutes per week require three additional hours of class preparation per week on the part of the student in lieu of an additional hour of formal instruction.

Attributes: ICC, REST.

WGSS 4999. Tutorial. (4 Credits)

Independent research and reading with supervision from a faculty member.