WGS Course Descriptions & Special Topics
Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies: Course Descriptions
WGS 101: Introduction to Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies
An introduction to Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies and to its perspectives. The course will use interdisciplinary perspectives to begin to examine the categories of gender and sexuality, as they intersect with race, ethnicity, class, nationality, disability and other sites of social inequality.
Gen Eds: Cultural Diversity and International Perspectives; Ethics; Social Contexts and Institutions
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WGS 102: Introduction to Activism and Community Projects
An exploration of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies methods, histories, and perspectives for enrolled RLE learners. This course will apply interdisciplinary scholarship to consider matters grounded in Women’s Studies, Gender Studies, and Sexuality Studies or relating to positive social change. Particular attention is given to activating feminist theories, namely Brown’s Emergent Strategy. Brown, and assigned texts, detail nuanced relationships of identity, care networks, and power to build an empirical feminist praxis.
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WGS 103: Introduction to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Studies
Introduces the major perspectives and issues in lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer studies, including histories and institutions, identities and representations, and cultures and subcultures.
Gen Eds: Cultural Diversity and International Perspectives; Social Contexts and Institutions
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WGS 201: Topics in Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies*
An interdisciplinary, second-level study of topics relevant to women, gender, and sexuality. May be taken more than once for credit if the topics differs. WGS 101 is recommended as a prerequisite.
-see below for list of current and upcoming sections
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WGS 203: Men and Masculinities
This course examines the social construction of masculinity in Western culture, exploring men’s experiences in our society from multiple vantage points and examining the ways in which masculinity is understood, represented, and constructed in Western society. If this course was taken under as a topics course in WGS 201, it cannot be repeated for credit.
Gen Eds: Cultural Diversity and International Perspectives; Social Contexts and Institutions
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WGS 205: Introduction to Feminist and Critical Data Analysis
The course will feature a certain tension as we learn how to leverage software and mathematical methods to analyze publicly available data to investigate the history and present of marginalized groups and social inequities. Alongside this technical and quantitative work, we will consider various critiques of quantitative methods and Western knowledge in general.
Gen Eds: Quantitative Literacy or Mathematics, Social Contexts and institutions
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WGS 206: Investigating Equity
This course explores the ways in which equitable practices and mindsets result in inclusion, and whether and when inclusivity leads to diversity. After identifying the privileges at work in historical and contemporary contexts, students construct multimodal projects to represent the way/s that their everyday choices might shape their own and other’s experience of equity.
Gen Eds: Artistic and Creative Expression
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WGS 230: Women, Health, and the Environment.
This course examines the impact of man-made contaminants and constructs on human health. We explore the connections between health issues such as cancer, autoimmune disease, infertility and gender transition and substances in the environment and body that impact health. Standard scientific approaches will be combined with feminist analyses. Students will consider possibilities for conscious change and are encouraged to engage in transformative work.
Gen Eds: Ethics, Population and the Environment
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WGS 250: Women and Music:
This class explores the achievements and challenges that women have faced throughout the world as composers, performers, conductors, teachers, and patrons. A wide spectrum of musical works by women in a variety of styles will be studied, through recordings, videos and live performances. This class meets the Gen Ed requirements for ‘Artistic & Creative Expression’ and ‘Cultural Diversity & International Perspectives’. It is open to students of all academic disciplines, and fulfills the upper level music history requirement for music performance majors.
Gen Eds: Artistic and Creative Expressions
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WGS 260: Gardening as Social Justice.
This course provides an introductory look into the detailed study of gardening as both a site of social justice and as an amateur or professional practice. The practice of gardening is rooted in the histories of feminism, Native American studies, class and food insecurity, racial (in)justice, and more. This class will engage with the history and practice of gardening through an intersectional lens, to see how marginalized populations have reclaimed gardening to meet their needs. Students will also learn some of the scientific and ecological practices behind gardening. Students will work to design their own garden space, modifying and adapting their design as each week goes on, and will end the semester with a garden design of their own that has taken issues of social and environmental justice in mind.
Gen Eds: Artistic and Creative Expression
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WGS 270: Gender in Native American Cultures
This course explores the concept of gender in indigenous communities of North America. Course materials will explore historical and contemporary perspectives of gender and sexual orientation to better understand how Native communities define and practice gender. NAS 101 or WGS 101 is a recommended prerequisite. (WGS 270 and NAS 270 are identical courses.)
Gen Eds: Cultural Perspectives and international Perspectives; Social Contexts and Institutions
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WGS 280: Intersectionality and Social Movements
A bridge between introductory WGS courses and more focused WGS courses, WGS 280 explores topics from WGS 101 and WGS 103 such as transnational feminisms, queer theory, and ecology through intersectional perspectives which reveal the interconnected and overlapping nature of social categories such as gender, class, and race. Through close examination of a variety of texts dealing with equity and diversity, students connect pedagogies and theories to activism, self-reflection and social movements.
Gen Eds: Cultural Diversity and International Perspectives
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WGS 301: Intermediate Topics in Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies
An interdisciplinary, intermediate study of topics relevant to women, gender, and sexuality. May be taken more than once for credit if the topics differ. WGS 101 is a recommended prerequisite.
-see below for list of current and upcoming sections
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WGS 303: Social Movements, Media and Change
This course considers the roles of gender, race/ethnicity, sexuality, age, religion, and nationality in relation to an understanding of social movements and social change in the Modern Middle East from the 19th century to the present. The course will also assess different varieties of feminism and women’s movements such as the rise of the women’s press in Egypt and Turkey in the early 1900s, anticolonial activism in the 1940s-1960s, the Arab Spring, contemporary LGBTQ+ activism, and the current Iranian protests for “Woman, life, freedom!” (“Jin, jiyan, azadi!”). Alongside secondary sources, students will examine primary sources produced by these movements – pamphlets, posters, memoirs, and even YouTube videos and Instagram posts. No prior knowledge of Middle Eastern history is required and all course materials will be available in English.
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WGS 340: Transnational Feminisms
Constraints of geography on social and cultural arrangements are receding, a process with implications for the world’s women. Diverse transnational feminists provide different lenses on women’s work in factories, immigration, sex tourism, etc.
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WGS 351: Authoring Women’s Sexualities. This course explores how 21st century women (trans and cis) in both the US and abroad use fiction, memoir, and other literary forms to resist, revise, and even reinvent heterosexist narratives about gender identity, love, sexuality, marriage and family life. How might writers use literary forms to author (and authorize) diverse ideas about women’s sexualities? Multiple lenses will be used to address this question—from the interpretative practices of narrative theory to the questions that arise from gender, feminist and queer theories, to research on publishing and the literary marketplace.
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WGS 360: Gender and Cinema
This course examines the connections between gender and cinema by examining gender theory, film criticism, and the history of the opposed as well as recent activist movements around production, inclusion, and representation. The course also serves as an introduction to major developments in feminist film theory since its emergence in the 1970s. WGS 101 is a recommended prerequisite.
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WGS 371: Border-crossing: Gendered Perspectives on Modern Migration
In response to ongoing global crises of displacement and migration, writers and artists are constantly inventing ways to circumvent, challenge and soften contested borders of nation, culture, and language. Through the lens of border studies theory, and by examining diverse writing on and about borders, displacement and diaspora, facilitates a range of multi-genre written explorations of different intercultural crossings.
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WGS 401: Advanced Topics in Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies
An advanced, interdisciplinary study of topics such as “Interpersonal Violence” or “Global Feminism”. May be taken more than once if the topics differ.
-see below for list of current and upcoming sections
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WGS 410: Feminist, Gender and Queer Theory
An introduction to the overlapping but sometimes conflicting traditions of feminist, gender, and queer theories.
Gen Ed: Writing intensive in major
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WGS 411: Internship in WGS
| Students pursue internships in workplaces such as businesses, non-profits, and other organizations. Course meetings provide students with faculty mentorship, opportunities to troubleshoot their internship work with peers, and related course content. Topics covered may include diversity/equity/justice in the workplace, social justice in the community, correlation between academic courses and the workplace, and career-exploration/preparation. For each topic, strategies for improving workplace communication are also covered. Each student will design their internship in consultation with their host organization and the course instructor such that it meets their specific interests/goals. Internship work will vary, but typically includes activities such as research, ideation, communication, writing, public relations, editing, content development, community organizing, and other related activities.
WGS 499: Capstone requirement Capstone requirement: fulfilled by either WGS 410 or WGS 411, to be taken with a 0-credit WGS 499 |
SPECIAL TOPICS COURSES, CURRENT and UPCOMING SECTIONS (link, past offerings)
WGS 201:
Fall 2024: Transgender studies
The evolution of gender and power through both gender identity and gender expression has taken societies by storm. Why does gender strike a chord across cultures, geographies, and languages? How are transgender, Two-Spirit, and gender expansive identities a threat to authoritarianism around the global North and South? Students will be exposed to historic archives, recorded medias, and primary documents that reveal the workings of gender as imperative for individuals and systems alike. Nonfiction sources include Leslie Feinberg’s (1996) Transgender Warriors and The Transgender Issue: Trans Justice is Justice for All (Shon Faye, 2021); fiction sources explore the likes of Virginia Woolf’s (1928) Orlando and popular contemporary works like Gretchen Felker-Martin’s (2022) Manhunt.
Summer 2024:
Gender, Sexuality and Popular Culture (online)
The gender and popular culture seminar provides an introductory look into the detailed study of mainstream entertainment and its influence on and reaction to contemporary social issues. These issues include but are not limited to: the construction of gender identities, gender in the workplace, motherhood and the family, sexuality, socioeconomics, race, gendered violence, and standards of beauty. Seeing as how social media and entertainment play such an important role in our lives, students will learn not only how the social messages of the medium’s content provides insight into the role of gender in society, but also learn how supplementary cues such as reviews, blogs, publicity and interviews contribute to social commentary. The goal of this course is to teach students to regard popular culture as an institution worthy of critical discourse and gender analysis.
Gender, Race, Class and Mental Health (online)
This course will examine the history of women’s interactions with the psychiatric profession in Western society over the past two hundred years. From the inception of the psychiatric field, there have been clear gender biases in the description and treatment of mental disorders, such as S. Weir Mitchell’s prescribed treatment for “neurasthenic” women, Jean-Martin Charcot’s colorful descriptions of “hysterical women,” or Sigmund Freud’s theories on gender differences. This course will explore the role the psychiatric field has played in defining and shaping what has been considered normal or abnormal female behavior, ending with a discussion of the modern gender biases that are still found in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. We will examine the biological explanations that have often been used to explain mental disorder in women as well as former psychiatric practices, including the gynecological surgery that was performed on “insane” women. We will also look at the ways in which diagnoses have changed over time and at the ways in which certain diagnostic categories like “hysteria” and “nymphomania” have shifted. A key point of focus will be to look at the ways in which mental disorder in women may have served as a form of social protest at various times and at the ways in which, historically, women who deviated from their expected gender roles were more likely to be labeled as insane. Finally, we will explore the idea of whether or not mental illness is a “female malady” and look at the ways in which gender roles and gender stereotypes in Western society have contributed to a greater association between women and mental illness.
Spring 2024:
Sexual and Reproductive Health
The purpose of this course is to explore and analyze historical, political, economic and social factors that influence reproductive health and justice. The course proceeds from a feminist and reproductive justice lens. For the purposes of this course, reproductive justice is maintained as the human right to maintain bodily autonomy, to have children, to not have children, and to parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities (as defined by the Sister Song collection).
WGS 301
Fall 2024: “Family Systems that Harm Their Own and Pathways to Healing (online)
This course examines the various patterns that exist in certain family systems that consciously or unconsciously harm one or more of their own members, such as families where alcoholism is present, where there is physical, verbal, emotional, or sexual abuse. As a system, the family unit would ideally support and protect all of its members; however, we will explore what happens in families when this is not the case and give voice to the stories of the most vulnerable members in a family system, the targeted individual, scapegoat, “black sheep,” or “identified patient.” We study these family dynamics across racial, ethnic, class groups and examine the various strategies that targeted individuals in families have used to break free from harmful family dynamics, including the role of the first-personal narrative (autobiographical writing), expressive arts as therapy (dance, music, art therapy), as well the role of professional counseling. Our course of study includes feminist pedagogical, sociological, clinical counseling, and family and systems theories.
Fall 2024: Topics in Labor Studies: Work, Women and Labor Activism (synchronous online)
This course examines women’s symbiotic and changing relationships with work, their historical importance and contributions to labor and political activism, and the nexus between feminism and unionism from colonial times to the present. The course will explore these topics primarily in the context of the United States, but also in other world areas, using primary and secondary sources in U.S. women’s and labor history, and global case studies. We will analyze the ways in which gender has historically intersected with race, class, colonial relations, and war to create challenges and reinforce the continuity (and disruptions) of women’s work experience. We will also study the critical issues affecting women in today’s global workplace and women’s attempts to address these issues through union organizing, civic engagement, and feminist activism.
Spring 2024: Writing Food
How female food writers wrote their way out of the house” Food writing is never just about food. It’s about culture and family, public policy and health, science and sustainability, business and immigration and so much more. In this course we will explore the revolutionary role women food writers have played in cooking, eating, living and the way we experience food. Beginning with the earliest cookbook writers and weaving our way through the development of home economics columns in newspapers, women’s pages, food sections and into food memoirs and the development of food blogs and influencers, this survey of American food writing will explore the ways we write about and experience food and the women who created an industry around it. We will be reading notable food writers such as MFK Fisher, Ruth Reichl, Molly Wizenberg, Dorothy Neighbors, Marjorie Standish, Mildred Brown Schrumpf, Edna Lewis, Chelsey Luger, Alice Choi, Madder Jaffrey, Julia Child, Margot Anne Kelley and more. Assignments may include short response papers, journaling, personal essay writing, recipe development/recipe writing, and memoir.
WGS 401
Spring 2024: Feminisms
A historical and cultural study of various global movements for gender equality) In this course, we will examine the history and development of various global, feminist movements. While we will concentrate primarily on the history of feminist movements in the United States, Canada, and Great Britain, we will also explore some of the other global movements for gender equality. Our analysis will span three timeframes, the development and evolution of feminist thought during the nineteenth, twentieth and the early twenty-first century. We will explore the various waves of feminism and the important branches of feminist intellectual thought, including liberal feminism, psycho-analytical feminism, post-structuralist, radical, lesbian, and post-colonial feminism, etc. We will also explore important areas of intersection within in feminist thought such as intersectionality, standpoint, and queer theory. Our examinations will include reading some of the foundational texts and theorists of the various global movements for gender equality.
WGS 201 (spring 2025), Sheena Sheffield
Throwing Like a Girl: Explorations of the female body experience.
What does it mean to throw like a girl? What is “manspreading,” and what does it have to do with women’s athletic performance? This course introduces feminist perspectives on the body and explores the ways that western cultural expectations of femininity impact women’s athletic performance and access to sports. Through an intersectional feminist lens, we will examine the ways that race, class, gender identity, and ability influence how women’s bodies are perceived–and how these perceptions inform how women (both transgender and cisgender) navigate sports and athletics.