Courses

• CAS WS 101: Gender and Sexuality I: An Interdisciplinary Introduction
  Introduction to women's, gender, and sexuality studies, integrating approaches from the natural and social sciences and humanities, focused on the origins, diversity, and expression of gendered and sexed individuals. Topics include the evolutionary origin of sexes; evolution, development, and social construction of sex differences; sexual differences, similarities, and diversity in bodies, brains, behavior, and artistic and intellectual expressions. Team-taught. Students who complete both halves of the two-semester sequence WS 101/102 receive divisional studies credit for two courses, from two different divisions: Natural Science (without lab), Social Science, and/or Humanities. Neither WS 101 nor WS 102 alone carries divisional studies credit.
• CAS WS 102: Gender and Sexuality II: An Interdisciplinary Introduction
  Introduction to women's, gender, and sexuality studies, focused on communities and institutions. Integrates approaches from the natural and social sciences and humanities, including evolutionary, historical, and cross-cultural analyses, feminist and queer theory. Topics include human reproductive biology; patriarchy and sexual violence; parenting, kinship structures, and forms of intimacy; sexual selection; the construction of gender identity and sexual orientation; evolutionary medicine; and the relationship of academic research to social activism. Team-taught. Students who complete both halves of the two-semester sequence WS 101/102 receive divisional studies credit for two courses, from two different divisions: Natural Science (without lab), Social Science, and/or Humanities. Neither WS 101 nor WS 102 alone carries divisional studies credit.
• CAS WS 213: Sexism in the Twenty-First Century
  Examines the dynamics of contemporary institutions as they affect women's and men's lives, particularly in the United States-- the economy, politics, mass media and culture, the beautification industry, sex industries, and hook-up culture-- through the intersections of race, class, ethnicity, and sexual identity. Carries social science divisional credit in CAS. Cannot be taken for credit in addition to CAS WS 113.
• CAS WS 233: The Evolutionary Biology of Human Variation
  Addresses human biological variation. An introduction to the fundamentals of comparative biology, evolutionary theory, and genetics and considers how research in these fields informs some of our most culturally-engaged identities: race, sex, gender, sexuality, and body type. Carries natural sciences divisional credit (without lab) in CAS. Also offered as CAS AN 233.
• CAS WS 241: Sociology of Gender
  An introduction to the social construction of sex and gender with a focus on the economic, political, social, and cultural forces that shape gender relations. Examines gender as a social structure that patterns institutional inequalities and everyday interactions on society. Carries social sciences divisional credit in CAS. Also offered as CAS SO 241.
• CAS WS 305: Topics in Women's, Gender, & Sexuality Studies
  Three topics are offered Fall 2017. May be repeated for credit if topics are different. Section A1: Middle Eastern Women's Gaze. An exploration of written and visual texts by Arab, Israeli, Iranian, and Turkish women writers, film directors through multiple lenses: feminism, social thought, postcolonial theory and such. Critical readings demonstrate divergence regarding gender, modernization and globalization. Also offered as CAS LY 470 A1 and CAS XL 381 A1. Section B1: Change and Continuity on the Silk Road. Focuses on the Central Asian portion of the Silk Road from the border of China to Istanbul. An exploration of written and visual texts to understand shifts in gender dynamics in societies caught between Islam, communism and globalization. Also offered as CAS XL 381 B1. Section C1: Music, Gender, and Social Change. Music, Gender, and Social Change: Focuses on how sound and song foster explorations of gender, sexuality, race, and class. Genres include classical, jazz, blues, folk, hip-hop, rap, rock, and R&B, and course texts include recordings, lyrics, videos, and critical readings.
• CAS WS 326: Arts of Gender
  Examines representations of gender and sexuality in diverse art forms, including drama, dance, film, and literature, and how art reflects historical constructions of gender. Topic for Spring 2017: Queer Literature and Film. An overview of same-sex attraction in literature from the Greeks (Plato and Sappho) to the present and a study of queer identities in film from the silent period to the 21st century, both with a historical emphasis. Weekly screenings. Also offered as CAS CI 390 B1 and CAS EN 326 A1.
• CAS WS 328: Cultural Constructions of Motherhood
  Motherhood as an intellectual concern, social institution, and site of competing discourses. Impact of race, class, education, and sexual orientation on mothering. Topics include feminisms, celebrity moms, fathering, mother blame, maternal body image, the economic costs of motherhood. Carries social science divisional credit in CAS.
• CAS WS 340: Women, Race, and Gender in Mass Media
  Develops students' media literacy through hands-on analysis of media and pop culture representations of women, femininity, and race; their relation to women's lived experience; and the place of "feminine" values in contemporary culture.
• CAS WS 344: Images of Women in Popular Fiction
  Formulaic genres--fairy tales, romance fiction, detective novels, horror stories, and science fiction--offer a medium for tracing the development of representations of women. Course analyzes women's roles and functions in these genres, focusing on novels by American authors.
• CAS WS 346: Women and Film
  Study of principally American films, exploring how the medium has shaped and been shaped by cultural perceptions of women. Readings provide background for interpretation of films ranging from screwball comedy to film noir, "women's films," and films by women directors. Also offered as CAS CI 373.
• CAS WS 350: Women and Politics
  Readings, discussion, and field research on issues of women's relationship to the processes of political influence, change, and empowerment. Analysis of public policy related to women and children. Also offered as CAS PO 309.
• CAS WS 352: American Masculinities
  Considers the biological and social organization of masculinities; the ways culture reproduces/articulates masculinities, particularly with regard to race and class; how masculine identities are expressed; male privilege; alternative masculinities; and what is at stake in negotiating contemporary masculinities. Also offered as CAS SO 352.
• CAS WS 356: Women and Comedy in America
  Considers how comedy is marked by gender and allows women to defy the expectations of femininity and transmute aggression into humor; what women find funny; and how women use the power of humor for survival, resistance, subversion, and truth-telling.
• CAS WS 360: Global Feminism: Race and Gender in International Perspectives
  (Meets with CAS IR 358 E.) Exploration of critical issues concerning women, gender, and race throughout the world. Topics include women and the global economy, health care, reproduction, the dynamics of sex industries, violence against women, international women's movements, and political/institutional change.
• CAS WS 434: Monarchy in Modern Britain
  A seminar probing seminal moments in the history of modern British sovereignty, when the politics of the court intersected with the politics of the people. Particular consideration is given to how monarchy has survived as an institution. Also offered as CAS HI 434.
• CAS WS 450: Internships: Women, Gender, and Social Change
  A seminar which introduces students to the practices/ideas of social change organizations through local internships and weekly discussions related to class, race, sexuality, women and gender.
• CAS WS 451: Fashion as History
  This seminar treats clothing and other products of material culture as historical documents. Explores what clothing can tell us about key developments in the modern period relating to trade and commerce, empire, gender, class, industry, revolution, nation-building, identity politics, and globalization. Also offered as CAS HI 451.
• CAS WS 478: Women on Trial
  Explores historic and contemporary trials of women like Rosa Parks, Angela Davis, and Marissa Alexander in order to investigate how media shapes public and popular perceptions of race, class, gender, sexuality, and the law. Also offered as CAS HI 478.
• CAS WS 491: Directed Study: Women's and Gender Studies
  Individual instruction and supervised study project in women's or gender studies. Application form available in program office.

Back to full list of College of Arts & Sciences