Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies

• CAS WS 501: Justice and Community Engagement
  Community engagement as it exists at the intersection of justice ¿ social justice, criminal justice, educational justice, food justice, housing justice, restorative justice, and healing justice will be central to this course. You will examine these through both historical and contemporary perspectives. Using writing as a tool for advocacy, activism, and change-making, you will engage with seminal texts, critical discussions, and reflective practices to examine topics including racism, gender justice, LGBTQIA rights, and other social justice movements. Voices of those doing the work of change are highlighted and invited as guests. We will investigate justice and public health issues including attention to individual, intergenerational, and systemic trauma. With an intersectional lens, we explore how social justice issues are uniquely shaped by identity characteristics (race, gender, sexuality). Collectively, the class engages diverse approaches to understanding and facilitating justice and resilience. Inclusive and trauma-informed approaches to inquiry and writing provide a foundation for community centered justice work. Designed to foster a deeper understanding of change-making, we hope to equip you with practical skills to become an effective agent of change in your community and beyond.
• CAS WS 505: Topics in Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies
  May be repeated for credit as topic changes.
• CAS WS 507: Diversity of Sex
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: senior or graduate standing, and at least one of the following courses or equivalent: CAS BI 225, BI 309, BI 315, BI 4 07, or BI 410; or consent of instructor - Examines the integrative and comparative biology of sex and sexes based on readings drawn from recent primary literature, review papers, and book chapters. Effective Fall 2023, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Writing-Intensive Course, Oral and/or Signed Communication. Effective Fall 2025, this course fulfills a single unit in the following BU Hub area: Oral and/or Signed Communication.
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  • Oral and/or Signed Communication
• CAS WS 512: Sexual Violence
  This course engages the topics of sexual deviance and sexual trauma through multiple lens. These lenses include psychological, sociological, criminal justice, public health, and social justice perspectives. The course explores multiple facets of understanding sexual deviance and sexual trauma including legal and philosophical perspectives, historical activism, understanding and treatment of sexual offending, and survivor responses. The roles of multiple systems including the media, mental health organization and the criminal justice system are taken into account. This course includes ongoing group work that engages critical inquiry, addressing relevant topics in sexual trauma in practical ways. Students utilize knowledge of theory and research methodology to pursue real world responses to issues of sexual violence and trauma.
• CAS WS 525: Judith Butler
  Undergraduate prerequisites: two previous XL, WS, or PH courses; or consent of instructor. Graduate prerequisites: graduate standing. - An intensive study of Judith Butler's philosophical thought and social theory from the 1990s to the present, with an emphasis on the continuities and discontinuities between Butler's early work on gender performativity and more recent writings on racial justice, war, and violence.
• CAS WS 530: Global Intimacies: Sex, Gender, and Contemporary Sexualities
  Undergraduate Prerequisites: advanced undergraduate standing or graduate standing, or consent of instructor. - Explores theoretical and ethnographic approaches to gender, sex, and sexuality as linked to globalizing discourses and transnational mobilities. Readings and discussion emphasize intersections of sex, gender, labor, love, and marriage in a globalized world.
• CAS WS 559: Feminist Killjoys & Cynical Queers: Intersectional Theories of Affect
  Prerequisite: First-Year Writing Seminar (e.g., CASWR 100 or 120). - This class examines the affective turn, which has been marked by a shift towards bodily sensation, structures of feeling, and modes of relationality. We pay particular attention to cultural constructions of emotion such as happiness, shame, anger, and fear. Effective Fall 2025, this course fulfills a single requirement in each of the following BU HUB areas: Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings, Research and Information Literacy, Writing Intensive.
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  • Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings
  • Research and Information Literacy
  • Writing-Intensive Course
• CAS WS 562: Studies in Asexualities
  Pre- Requisites: First Year Writing Seminar (e.g., WR 100 or WR 120) - Writing intensive seminar that explores asexuality studies as well as various kinds of sexual and romantic absences in contemporary literature, literary analysis, and critical theory with particular attention to race and disability. Effective Spring 2024, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU HUB areas: Writing-Intensive, The Individual in Community, Aesthetic Exploration.
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  • Aesthetic Exploration
  • The Individual in Community
  • Writing-Intensive Course
• CAS WS 594: Advanced Feminist Theory
  This course explores themes in advanced feminist theory. Specific themes vary by semester. Effective Fall 2025, this course fulfills a single unit in the following BU Hub area: Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings.
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  • Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings
• CAS WS 617: Gender and Crime
  Examines social forces shaping gender discrepancies in crime. Using a feminist lens, students explore how cultural ideologies about masculinity and femininity shape criminalization, victimization, and offending. Topics include the gendered contexts of crime and punishment, gender-based violence, and intimate labor. Effective Fall 2023 this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Oral and/or Signed Communication, The Individual in Community, Teamwork/Collaboration.
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  • The Individual in Community
  • Oral and/or Signed Communication
  • Teamwork/Collaboration
• CAS WS 631: Seminar: Genders, Sexualities, and Youth Cultures
  Investigates the social construction of gender and sexuality in adolescence. Engaging critical approaches to youth cultures, the course examines the structural conditions that shape gender and sexuality norms, and the ways youth navigate and redefine their social worlds. Effective Fall 2023 this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: The Individual in Community, Social Inquiry II, Research and Information Literacy.
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  • The Individual in Community
  • Research and Information Literacy
  • Social Inquiry II
• CAS WS 642: Philosophy and Feminism
  Undergraduate prerequisites: two courses in philosophy or consent of instructor. An advanced survey course of historical and contemporary philosophical approaches to feminism. Topics include: methodology, ethics, epistemology, metaphysics, black feminist thought, decolonial feminism, global feminism, philosophy of gender, and queer and trans philosophy.
• CAS WS 658: The Nonbinary Nineteenth Century
  Undergraduate prerequisite: First Year Writing Seminar (e.g., CASWR 100 or WR 120). - Examines fictional and non fictional works from nineteenth-century France on themes of sexual and gender identity, contextualized through contemporary queer, trans, and feminist theory.
• CAS WS 660: Topics in LGBTQ History
  Undergrad prerequisites: First Year Writing Seminar (e.g., CAS WR100 or WR120). - Seminar examines topics in the history of LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer) people and cultural or political movements. May be repeated for credit if topics vary. Effective Fall 2024, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Historical Consciousness, Oral and Signed Communication, Research and Information Literacy.
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  • Historical Consciousness
  • Oral and/or Signed Communication
  • Research and Information Literacy
• CAS WS 665: Intersectionalities: Theories, Methods, and Praxis
  Undergraduate pre-requisites: junior standing or consent of instructor. - "Intersectionality," is one of the prominent contributions made by critical race feminist scholars that now broadly extend across disciplines. This course takes stock of the multiple ways that intersectional scholars and activists conceptualize intersectionality in relation to sociological theory, research problems, design, and praxis.
• CAS WS 679: Fatal Women and Dangerous Bodies
  Prerequisites: First Year Writing Seminar (e.g., CASWR 100 or WR 120). - Examines depictions of the femme fatale and fears of female sexuality in realist, naturalist and decadent French fictions. Effective Fall 2025, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Aesthetic Exploration, Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy, Writing-Intensive Course.
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  • Aesthetic Exploration
  • Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy
  • Writing-Intensive Course
• CAS WS 700: Directed Study Women, Gender & Sexuality Studies
  Directed study in Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies.
• CAS WS 801: Theories and Methods in Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies
  Explores the variety and complexity of theories and methods in the interdisciplinary fields of women's, gender, and sexuality studies. Provides a forum for assessing research strategies used by gender and sexuality scholars. Required for the WGS Program Graduate Certificate.