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The listing of a course description here does not guarantee a course’s being offered in a particular term. Please refer to the published schedule of classes on the MyBU Student Portal for confirmation a class is actually being taught and for specific course meeting dates and times.

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  • CAS WS 345: Shariah Law
    Shariah Law looks behind the stereotypes and headlines--despotic rulers, barbaric punishments, women's oppression--to understand the origins, history, and structure of Islamic law. Explores its implementation in various times and places, modern transformations, and contemporary debates over legal reform. Effective Spring 2025, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Oral and/or Signed Communication, Ethical Reasoning, Research and Information Literacy.
    • Ethical Reasoning
    • Oral and/or Signed Communication
    • Research and Information Literacy
  • CAS WS 347: Feminist Inquiry
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: sophomore, junior, or senior standing. - A survey of feminist theories and development of strands of feminist inquiry in the academy, movements, and politics. Considers the commonalities and contrast in gender relations across cultures and tensions between major feminist schools of thought. Effective Fall 2024 fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Creativity/Innovation, Oral and/or Signed Communication, Social Inquiry I.
    • Creativity/Innovation
    • Oral and/or Signed Communication
    • Social Inquiry I
  • CAS WS 352: American Masculinities
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: one 100- or 200-level course in either sociology or women's, gender, & sexuality. - This course will explore masculinity: as a historical, social construct and site of power and violence; as a facet of identity and system of oppression; as style, myth, and representation; as something perpetually in "crisis" and in need of recuperation; as a process that helps and harms; as a set of ideals, practices, and traditions; and as system that cuts across race, ethnicity, sexuality, social class, nation, geography and place, age, and other lines of difference. Effective Fall 2021, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Digital/Multimedia Expression, Social Inquiry I, Critical Thinking.
    • Critical Thinking
    • Digital/Multimedia Expression
    • Social Inquiry I
  • CAS WS 375: Growing Up in Korea
    Examining memoirs, biographies, prose fiction, poetry, films, television dramas, and graphic narratives asking: how have Korean women recounted women’s lives through media? What roles have gender and sexuality played in stories of ‘growing up' from the late 1800s to today? Effective Spring 2019, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Aesthetic Exploration, Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy.
    • Aesthetic Exploration
    • Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy
  • CAS WS 377: Gender and Sexuality in Judaism
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: First Year Writing Seminar (e.g., WR 100 or WR 120). - Explores the role of gender and sexuality in Judaism and Jewish experience, historically and in the present. Subjects include constructions of masculinity and femininity, attitudes toward (and uses of) the body and sexuality, gendered nature of religious practice and authority. Effective Fall 2021, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Writing-Intensive Course, Historical Consciousness, Research and Information Literacy.
    • Historical Consciousness
    • Research and Information Literacy
    • Writing-Intensive Course
  • CAS WS 380: Gender and Identity in Contemporary Middle Eastern Film
    An exploration of representations of gender and identity in contemporary Middle Eastern films by male and female directors reflecting on the impact of modernization, globalization, war and trauma through different visual genres. Effective Fall 2019, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Aesthetic Exploration, Digital/Multimedia Expression.
    • Aesthetic Exploration
    • Digital/Multimedia Expression
  • CAS WS 382: Women's Literary Cultures
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: one previous literature course or junior or senior standing. - Writings by women in diverse literary forms, including drama, poetry and prose. How does women's literary culture reflect historical constructions of gender and sexuality' How do writers engage with new literary forms, like the lyric, political treatise, or the novel' Effective Fall 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: The Individual in Community, Aesthetic Exploration.
    • Aesthetic Exploration
    • The Individual in Community
  • CAS WS 393: Technoculture and Horizons of Gender and Race
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: one previous literature course or junior or senior standing. - Explores new media theory, postmodernist thought, social media, and video games to confront gender, race, and sexuality. Through critical reading, writing, and hands-on digital technology use, students consider how race, sexuality, and gender live in virtual worlds. Effective Fall 2019, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: The Individual in Community, Digital/Multimedia Expression.
    • Digital/Multimedia Expression
    • The Individual in Community
  • CAS WS 395: Inhuman Films: Genders, Animals, Machines
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: First-Year Writing Seminar (e.g., WR 120). - This course explores what happens to the "human" at the intersection of feminist theory and cinematic representation. How and why do films assign humanity to some figures and withhold it from others on the basis of race, gender, "ability," etc.' Effective Fall 2023, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Writing-Intensive Course, Digital/Multimedia Expression, Aesthetic Exploration.
    • Aesthetic Exploration
    • Digital/Multimedia Expression
    • Writing-Intensive Course
  • CAS WS 396: Philosophy of Gender and Sexuality
    Analyzes gender and sexuality from an intersectional perspective. Focus on metaphysics, epistemology, and semantics to understand gender and sexuality as they exist within interlocking systems of oppression including racism, sexism, transphobia, homophobia, and fatphobia. Effective Fall 2018, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings, The Individual in Community, Critical Thinking.
    • Critical Thinking
    • The Individual in Community
    • Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings
  • CAS WS 398: Feminist Political Theory
    Introduces students to key texts, problems, and debates in western feminist political theory. Students study major feminist thinkers, and explore diverse approaches to crucial topics in the field: such as ¿white feminism,¿ marriage, disability, sex, and pornography.
  • CAS WS 400: Gender and Healthcare
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: CASWR 120 or equivalent. - Focuses on strengthening students' knowledge, skills, and ability to construct a critical appraisal of all the determinants, distribution, causes, mechanisms, systems, and consequences of health inequities related to gender including how gender influences and is influenced by healthcare systems. Effective Summer 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: The Individual in Community, Research and Information Literacy.
    • The Individual in Community
    • Research and Information Literacy
  • CAS WS 420: Queer Theory
    Surveys major texts and arguments in queer theory from Butler's Gender Trouble to contemporary discussions of cisnormativity, homonationalism, affect, pinkwashing, crip theory, and queer-of-color critique. Explores different uses of queer theory in legal debates, literary analysis, and cultural criticism. Effective Spring 2021, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: The Individual in Community, Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings, Critical Thinking.
    • Critical Thinking
    • The Individual in Community
    • Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings
  • CAS WS 430: Global Maternal & Child Health
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: senior standing. - Provides a global perspective on maternal and child health. Major topics include early life influences on later life health, maternity care practices worldwide, and the role of both human evolutionary history and sociopolitical structures in shaping health outcomes for women and children.
  • CAS WS 431: Seminar: Genders, Sexualities, and Youth Cultures
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: senior standing or consent of instructor. - 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.
    • The Individual in Community
    • Research and Information Literacy
    • Social Inquiry II
  • CAS WS 432: Gender, Sexuality, and Buddhism
    Examines gender and sexuality in various Buddhist cultures from a broad range of time periods such as ancient India, medieval China, and modern America. Topics include: family, the body, lust, abortion, and menstruation. Effective Spring 2024, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy, Aesthetic Exploration, Critical Thinking.
    • Aesthetic Exploration
    • Critical Thinking
    • Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy
  • CAS WS 434: Monarchy in Modern Britain
    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. Effective Fall 2019, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Historical Consciousness, Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy, Critical Thinking.
    • Critical Thinking
    • Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy
    • Historical Consciousness
  • CAS WS 442: Philosophy and Feminism
    Undergraduate pre-requisites: 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 450: Internships: Women, Gender, and Social Change
    Undergraduate Prerequisites: junior or senior standing; or two prior WGS electives; or consent of i nstructor. - 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. Effective Fall 2019, this course fulfills a single unit in the following BU Hub area: Historical Consciousness, Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy, Critical Thinking.
    • Critical Thinking
    • Global Citizenship and Intercultural Literacy
    • Historical Consciousness

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