WGST 101 - Issues in Feminism (4 Credit Hours)

An introduction to the field of Women’s and Gender Studies, this interdisciplinary course considers the socio-political meanings and practices of gender in our lives. It examines whether gender is biologically or socially constructed and how notions of femininity and masculinity are (re)produced. Students will analyze the workings of power and the social production of inequality in institutions such as the family, the workplace, and the state, taking into account the intersections among gender, race, class, ethnicity, nationality, sexuality. Topics will include sexual and gender violence, equal rights, reproductive technologies, body image, and transnational feminist issues. A central aim of the course is to develop critical reading and thinking about the plurality of women’s experiences and about the ways in which women have resisted inequalities and engaged in local/global politics for social transformation and change. This course fulfills the Interdivisional (I), Power and Justice (P), and Oral Communication (R) GE requirements and is required for WGST majors/minors.

Crosslisting: QS 290.

WGST 108 - Bible, Gender and Sexuality (4 Credit Hours)

This course is an introduction to the various and often conflicting ways in which gender and sexuality are represented in biblical texts as well as the range of interpretations of these texts over time. In this course, we will read ancient texts alongside contemporary theories of gender and sexuality. On the one hand, we will consider how biblical texts have been used to construct categories of "normal" and "natural" gender and sexuality and, on the other, how they might be read to undermine or subvert these frameworks. In addition to historically contextualizing ideas about gender and sexuality within biblical texts, we will also address contemporary uses of the Bible in public debates. This course fulfills the Power and Justice (P) GE requirement.

Crosslisting: REL 108 and QS 108.

WGST 110 - Biology and Politics of Women's Health (4 Credit Hours)

This course examines critical conversations in the biology, politics, culture, and history of women’s health. The nation’s greatest health issues include, but are not limited to, unmanaged chronic conditions (including cardiovascular health), environmental health risks and cancer, racial and ethnic health disparities, women's reproductive and sexual health, and the epidemic of obesity. Barriers in healthcare delivery, at healthcare system and provider levels, exist for women, trans people, and non-binary people. Evaluating the complexities of these gendered health issues involves both scientific literacy and socio-cultural literacy. This course provides a fundamental understanding of how biological system structures and functions are related, specific to the female human body. The laboratory component of this course familiarizes students with the scientific method, feminist theory in science, and methods in women’s health research. This course promotes proficiency in oral communication through practice in a variety of formats that typically occur in biology and women's and gender studies.

Crosslisting: BIOL 110.

WGST 162 - Self-Defense for Everyday Life (1 Credit Hour)

This is an empowered self-defense course that will equip participants with verbal and physical skills to defend themselves in a variety of situations. The class combines emotional, mental and physical strategies that address situations ranging from street and job harassment, dating abuse, threats and harassment, conflicts with acquaintances and sexual assault. Based on empowerment principles of choice, context, systems of abuse, intersectionality and identity, students will learn how to manage their adrenaline, respond to threat and fear, and ground themselves in times of stress with simple easy to learn techniques. These skills are practical for everyday situations.

Crosslisting: PHED 162.

WGST 180 - Special Topics in Women's and Gender Studies (4 Credit Hours)

Selected topics in Women's and Gender Studies.

WGST 205 - Gender and Globalization (4 Credit Hours)

The rapid integration of global markets that has taken place since the 1980s is the outcome of a common set of economic policies implemented in both developed and developing countries. This course examines the contradictory impacts of these policies on gender relations and asks: what challenges do global economic trends pose for gender equality and equity in both developed and developing countries? To answer this question, we begin with an introduction to alternative approaches to economics, focusing on the differences between neoclassical and feminist economics, and history and economic dimension of globalization. This will be followed by an exploration of the impacts of economic development policy on gender relations in the context of a globalizing world economy. Special topics will include the household as a unit of analysis; women’s unpaid labor; the gendered impacts of economic restructuring and financial crisis; the feminization of the labor force in the formal and informal sectors of the global economy; care penalty and the gendered impacts of COVID-19. The course will conclude with an evaluation of tools and strategies for achieving gender equity within the context of a sustainable, human-centered approach to economic development. This course satisfies the economics writing requirement, and the college W GE requirement, and as such the course will help to develop your writing and research skills within the economics discipline.

Prerequisite(s): ECON 101 and ECON 102.

Crosslisting: ECON 205 and INTL 252.

WGST 210 - Sex, Gender & Work (4 Credit Hours)

This course explores the relationship among sex, gender, and labor from the Industrial Revolution to the present. Drawing on history, anthropology, and feminist theory, the course examines various kinds of labor—emotional labor, care work, bureaucratic white-collar work, and sex work, among others—to examine how sex and gender have shaped the perceived value, as well as the legal and social status, or different kinds of work.

Crosslisting: GC 210.

WGST 217 - Photograph as Gesture into Time: Past, Present, Future (4 Credit Hours)

This is an upper-level photography course that asks students to consider the photograph as a disruptive force with potential energy for re-imagining the relationship to self, history, document, and time. Using a specifically BIPOC (Black Indigenous People of Color), feminist, and queer representation of artists and theorists, students will be asked to critically engage with the issues and possibilities of non-dominant stories and documents. Students will be encouraged and supported to find their own empowered, creative, and critical voice to speak back to traditionally white hetero-patriarchal power. Students will use digital cameras (DSLRs) to capture both still images and video. Students will further their knowledge of Lightroom, Photoshop, and learn the basics of Adobe Premiere.

Prerequisite(s): ARTS 117.

Crosslisting: ARTS 217 and QS 217.

WGST 218 - Sacred Texts and Social Justice (4 Credit Hours)

From women’s Suffrage to Black Lives Matter, biblical texts, ideas, and ideals have played a significant role in movements and struggles for equity and justice in the United States. In this course, we will consider the role that sacred texts play in movements for social change, analyze how ideas about the Bible and the Bible as an idea are invoked in public discourse, and evaluate the rhetorical and interpretive moves by which the same sets of texts could be invoked to maintain the status quo or transform relations of power. This course will discuss historical movements for social change in the United States, but will focus primarily on movements for anti-racism and reproductive justice in the 21st century.

Crosslisting: BLST 238 and REL 238.

WGST 220 - Women in Music (4 Credit Hours)

Historically, women have played an integral role in musical traditions around the world, although the extent of their contributions has only recently been recognized and studied in an academic context. This course traces the development and current state of women's roles in music, including Western art music composers, performers, critics, and teachers; performers of popular American genres such as jazz, country, and rock; and performers of popular "World Beat" and traditional world musics.

Crosslisting: MUS 220.

WGST 223 - Women in United States History (4 Credit Hours)

This course surveys the history of women in the United States from 1848 to the present. We will explore the lived experiences of many different kinds of women and analyze the ways in which other categories of identity -- race, ethnicity, nationality, class, sexual orientation, age, etc. -- affect those experiences. We will also explore the development of feminist consciousness among U.S. women, and analyze attempts to expand that consciousness both nationally and globally. This course fulfills the Humanities distribution requirement for WGST majors.

Crosslisting: HIST 192.

WGST 225 - Women in Literature (4 Credit Hours)

Selected poetry and prose by women guide inquiries into writing and gender and into related issues, such as sexuality, history, race, class, identity and power. This course fulfills the Humanities distribution requirement for WGST majors.

Crosslisting: ENGL 225.

WGST 227 - Women's Spiritual Activism (4 Credit Hours)

What is women's spiritual activism in our contemporary society? What can we learn from those who have struggled to bring gender equality and peace in human society? Is religion anti-feminist or feminism anti-religious? In spite of cultural, racial and religious diversity among women across the globe, women often share the similar stories of physical and psychological suffering caused by their institutionalized religions and societies. Many of these women also testify that their religions enabled them to resist injustice and to build up solidarity with others including men. This course invites the students to explore the spiritual journeys of the feminist activists--their struggles for justice for all humanity. This course fulfills the Humanities and Transnational Feminism distribution requirements for WGST majors/minors.

Crosslisting: REL 227.

WGST 229 - Mediating Gender and Sexuality (4 Credit Hours)

In this class we will critically examine and evaluate the cultural construction and representation of gender and sexuality from an intersectional, transnational perspective.We will focus on a variety of media texts, platforms, and technologies. Although gender is the primary identity construction examined in this course, we will also pay close attention to how sexuality, race, ethnicity, class, and geography interlock.Drawing from a broad range of academic literature, including critical/cultural studies, transnational feminism, and media studies, we will shift our focus from stable categories of identity to how gender and sexuality are produced through and around media. This course fulfills the Social Sciences distribution requirement for WGST majors.

Crosslisting: COMM 229 and QS 229.

WGST 243 - Sex and Sexuality in Latin America (4 Credit Hours)

This course critically examines the social construction of gender and sexuality in Latin America from the pre-Hispanic era through the modern period. Particularly, it will explore the various attempts by the ruling elite to define acceptable and deviant gender roles and sexual identities, how the non-elite resisted the imposition of those elite notions of propriety to create their own codes of conduct, and how those conflicts have changed over time. Moreover, we will survey how historians use issues relating to gender and sexuality – domestic violence, prostitution, homosexuality, transvestitism, etc. – to elucidate the histories of Latin America.

Crosslisting: HIST 243 and LACS 243.

WGST 265 - Black Women and Organizational Leadership (4 Credit Hours)

This class explores Black women's leadership orientations in organizations. Afrocentric and womanist frameworks are used to inquire about Black women's leadership in the context of their lives. In this course we explore and theorize Black women's use of communal and generative leadership orientations as well as their application of a multiple and oppositional consciousness. Organizational dilemmas stemming from their race, class, and gender, as well as the unique challenges Black women leaders face in creating a supportive life structure are examined. Students will critique the omission of Black women's leadership styles in the mainstream theories about leadership, as well as explore the implications of Black women's leadership for expanding mainstream theory. This course fulfills the Women of Color in the U.S. distribution requirements for the WGST major and the BLST (Black Studies) cross-listed course requirement for WGST majors/minors.

Crosslisting: BLST 265.

WGST 274 - Cultural Studies (4 Credit Hours)

This course frames Western concert dance as a complex political activity made public through various agendas of race, creed, national origin, sexuality, and gender. Students may simultaneously be exposed to poststructuralist epistemology, feminist theory, and power & justice ideology while they are meeting a survey of historical works. In this way, the course is less about coming to know a canon of "masterworks" and more about learning how to interrogate dance in many cultures from multiple perspectives. Students will be expected to engage in movement activities as a method toward an embodied understanding of theory, but will not be evaluated on their movement performance or ability. No dance experience necessary. This course fulfills the I and P GE requirements and the Arts distribution requirement for WGST majors.

WGST 275 - Philosophy of Feminism (4 Credit Hours)

Feminism and philosophy both make the invisible visible, the implicit explicit. Both make us aware of assumptions we make in our everyday lives and challenge us to justify them. This course examines ways in which feminist theory enriches philosophy and vice versa. Feminist criticism probes some of the most fundamental philosophical assumptions about our knowledge of and interaction with the world and other people. How does feminism destabilize philosophy and affect philosophical conceptions of knowledge, reality, metaphysics, agency, or morality? How does philosophy enrich feminist understandings of oppression, privilege, or equality? We will consider a range of forms of oppression and privilege, particularly as they affect women, and conceptions of sex, gender, and race in the context of debates about gender violence, work and family, as well as feminist discussions of epistemology, ethics, and science.

Prerequisite(s): One previous course in Philosophy or Women’s and Gender Studies, or consent.

Crosslisting: PHIL 275 and QS 275.

WGST 276 - Gender, War and Conflict (4 Credit Hours)

This course aims to make feminist sense of contemporary wars and conflicts. It analyzes the intersections between gender, race, class, and ethnicity in national conflicts. The class traces the gendered processes of defining citizenship, national identity and security, and examines the role of institutions like the military in the construction of femininity and masculinity. The course focuses on the gendered impact of war and conflict through examining torture, mass rape, genocide, and refugee displacement. It analyzes the strategies used by women's and feminist movements, to oppose war and conflict, and the gendered impact of war prevention, peacekeeping, and post-war reconstruction. The class draws on cases from Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East and North Africa. The class is interdisciplinary and gives equal weight to theory and practice while drawing on writings by local and global activists and theorists. This course fulfills the Social Sciences and Transnational Feminism distribution requirements for WGST majors/minors.

Prerequisite(s): INTL 100 or WGST 101.

Crosslisting: INTL 250.

WGST 285 - Decolonial Feminist Thought and Practice (4 Credit Hours)

Decolonization, according to Nelson Maldonado-Torres, refers to “a confrontation with the racial, gender, and sexual hierarchies that were put in place or strengthened by European modernity as it colonized and enslaved populations throughout the planet” (2007, 261).This course takes as its focus this confrontation and examines central themes and questions in feminist decolonial praxis, including the following: What is the relationship between colonialism, imperialism, and occupation (both historical and contemporary) to racial, gender, and sexual hierarchies? How have struggles for gender, racial, indigenous, caste, and sexual justice challenged these hierarchies? What are decolonial feminist approaches to struggle? In the course, we will examine the possibilities and challenges involved in transforming institutional and structural power relations as well as everyday habits and practices of being and relating. Throughout the course, we will examine the interplay of gender, race, class, sexuality, and nationality and pay close attention to questions of methodology, epistemology, and pedagogy.

Prerequisite(s): WGST 101 or QS 290.

Crosslisting: EDUC 285.

WGST 287 - Testimonio, Memory and Feminist Resistance - Central America & its Diaspora (4 Credit Hours)

This course examines testimonio as a feminist and decolonial practice emerging from Central America and its diasporic communities. Rooted in struggles against colonialism, U.S. intervention, patriarchy, and state violence, testimonio functions not only as a literary genre but as a collective act of memory, survival, and political resistance. Students will engage literature alongside news media, community archives, digital testimonios, and other cultural and historical sources to unpack how feminist practices emerge from these spaces. Grounded in an intersectional decolonial approach, the course centers the interconnected forces of race, gender, sexuality, class, indigeneity, migration status, and geography in shaping both oppression and resistance. Through close reading, contextual analysis, and interdisciplinary research, students will examine how activists, writers, and communities narrate violence, produce counter-archives, and generate decolonial knowledge across borders.

Crosslisting: LACS 287.

WGST 289 - Gender and Digital Society in Global Context (4 Credit Hours)

This course explores the intersection of gender and digital technologies in a globalized world. Based on scholarship from sociology, science and technology studies, and intersectional feminism, we will examine how digital technologies both shape and are shaped by the dynamics of gender relations in China, East Asia, the U.S., and beyond. Key topics include the gender digital divide, labor inequalities in the tech sector, the changing STEM education, digitalization of family life, as well as women’s contributions to the digital economy and the role of social media in emerging feminist activism. Students will also work with large-scale datasets from East Asia and the U.S. to learn how to analyze and visualize data to answer theory-driven questions. By combining theoretical reading and empirical endeavors, students will understand the complex role of technology in both empowering and marginalizing women in global context.

Crosslisting: EAST 289.

WGST 292 - History of Reproductive Justice in the United States (4 Credit Hours)

This course explores the history of what has come to be known as reproductive justice—the efforts of women and other people who can become pregnant to control their own reproductive lives, to choose whether and when to have children, and to ensure that they can bear and raise children in safe and healthy ways. We will survey this history from the colonial era to the present, with a particular eye toward how hierarchies of power based on race, gender, and other categories of identity have shaped women’s experiences. We will examine how women’s reproductive autonomy was circumscribed in the past by enslavement, eugenic ideologies, forced sterilization programs, and other practices, as well as how it has been affected more recently by factors like anti-choice campaigns and Supreme Court decisions. We will also learn, however, about women’s knowledge of the functioning of their own bodies, about how they have maintained some degree of autonomy over their bodies even under oppressive circumstances, and about how people have collectively struggled to ensure that everyone can determine the course of their own reproductive lives.

Crosslisting: HIST 292.

WGST 302 - Women and the Arts (4 Credit Hours)

This topics course considers works created by artists who self-identify as "female." The course will include engaging in, looking at, and reading about art making, focusing on historical examples and the art of everyday life. Questions about creativity, expectations, limitations, and releasing into the unknown will be considered alongside socio-cultural environments, surveillance, and judgment about who can and who cannot easily identify, and be read, as art makers in various cultures.

WGST 305 - Ethics of Sex and Love: Moral Discourses on Religion, Gender, and Sexuality (4 Credit Hours)

What does religion have to do with intimate love between two adults? Does the Christian Bible teach that homosexual relations are wrong? Does Islam encourage men to discipline their wives physically and emotionally? Is abortion wrong? Why does the state try to regulate sexual behaviors in society? Who has the right to exercise socially acceptable sexuality and express gender? Why is gender-based sexual violence persistent? How is the social perception of sexual promiscuity associated with race? Based on the hypothesis that gender and sexuality are the signifiers of power relations, this course explores morally complex and tough questions concerning human sexuality, intersecting with race, class, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and secular politics. Students will interrogate how religion and state power have historically shaped the dominant understanding of sexual morality, masculinity, and femininity. Taking religion as analytical tools, the course will examine social issues such as same-sex relations, marriage, reproductive justice, domestic violence, and militarized sexual violence. By reading queer scholars of color’s challenges of the mainstream discourse on sex, students will learn how to queer sexual ethics shaped by religion and society and to map out their sexual ethics in light of love and justice.

Crosslisting: REL 305 and QS 305.

WGST 306 - Transnational Feminism (4 Credit Hours)

This class provides students with the ability to understand, critique, and comparatively analyze the politics of gender in transnational contexts. The course traces the development of feminist thinking and practice within national, regional and transnational contexts, and maps the political agendas of women's and feminist movements in various countries around the world. The course focuses on how feminism emerges in a particular context and the specific issues that galvanize women to act for change. The course explores the connections between feminism, colonization, nationalism, militarization, imperialism, and globalization, and analyzes the processes by which the agendas of women from the global north and south come together or clash. The course examines through specific examples from Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East and North Africa the concerns and challenges facing transnational women's and feminist movements today. The class is interdisciplinary and draws on writings by local and global activists and theorists. This course fulfills the I GE requirement and the Social Sciences andTransnational Feminism distribution requirements for WGST majors/minors.

Prerequisite(s): WGST 101 or permission of instructor.

WGST 310 - Feminist Research Methods (4 Credit Hours)

This course examines both scientific methods and social analysis based on empirical research and the interpretive strategies that have developed out of the humanities for understanding societies. It provides experience in the design and implementation of social and cultural research with a focus on women's studies. The course will examine the epistemological issues that underlie research in women's and gender studies, the ethical and political questions involved, and the assumptions that shape various methods. Students will apply the methods learned to their own research projects. This.

WGST 311 - Feminist Theory (4 Credit Hours)

This course examines various ways of understanding gender by looking at a variety of feminist theories. Theories studied may include psychoanalytic, feminist theory, cultural materialist feminist theory, etc. Particular consideration will be given to issues raised by multiculturalism, women of color, womanist perspectives, queer theory, class concerns, international and transnational movements. The course will introduce students to a variety of theories to enable them both to recognize and use those theories in their research and social practice. Students will be encouraged to become reflective about their own theoretical stances and to consider how societies can move closer to justice for both women and men. This course is required for WGST majors and minors.

Prerequisite(s): WGST 101 or QS 290.

Crosslisting: QS 311.

WGST 312 - Gender and Sexuality in Antiquity (4 Credit Hours)

This course explores how power and status worked in the family, in politics, labor practices, and religious institutions during classical antiquity, focusing on the intersections of gender, class, ethnicity, and sexuality.

Crosslisting: AGRS 311 and QS 312.

WGST 321 - Ethics of Peace and War (4 Credit Hours)

War is one of our time's most important “ethical” issues. Peace is a forced option when humanity faces the horrendous evil of violence. What roles does religion play in making war and making peace? Can we imagine peace independent from war? This course encourages students to take war and militarism into serious ethical consideration and to contemplate peace and justice in a global society. By critically analyzing the issues, theories, and practices of war and peacemaking, students will be prepared to be autonomous thinkers and responsible global citizens who can discern how to make peace in a violent world and how to heal the world broken by war and violence.

Crosslisting: REL 302.

WGST 325 - African-American Women's Literature (4 Credit Hours)

Historical and contemporary African-American women's literature grounds an inquiry into black women's literary and intellectual traditions within the matrix of race, gender, class and sexual relations in the United States. This course fulfills the Humanities and Women of Color in the U.S distribution requirements for WGST majors and the Black Studies (BLST) cross-listed course requirement for WGST majors/minors.

Crosslisting: BLST 325 and ENGL 325.

WGST 327 - Women and Social Ethics in the Global Context (4 Credit Hours)

The personal is internationally political!" Whether we are aware or not, we live in the globalized world and our actions here and now affect the lives of millions of people whom we may never meet face to face. Through the religious concept of "interdependence" with the secular understanding of "women's rights as human rights," this course will analyze and explore globalized issues of poverty, war, sex-trafficking, migration, reproductive rights, and religious conflict as well as ethically consider how diverse social groups are interconnected to each other beyond national and religious boundaries; and how we study, analyze, and practice transnational feminist activism for all humanity. This course fulfills the Humanities and Transnational Feminism distribution requirements for WGST majors/minors.

Crosslisting: REL 327.

WGST 328 - Buddhism, Gender, & Sexuality (4 Credit Hours)

Historian Joan Wallach Scott once warned that scholars could not simply insert gender into their research as though adding a new room on a house already built; they would have to begin again from the bottom. Considering gender as a cultured way of being in, understanding, and interacting with the world within which we are situated, this seminar queries the conceptualization of gender and sexuality in Buddhism and Buddhist communities across space and time, with particular emphasis on those located in Asia. What does it mean to be a woman, a man, someone of the third sex, or none of the above? What are the Buddhist idea(l)s about femininity, masculinity, and personhood? How do these idea(l)s change with translation and transmission? We will explore together the theories and practices of gender and sexuality proposed by Buddhist communities from its beginnings to the present day. Buddhism’s major conversation partners throughout history – Hinduism, Confucianism, and Daoism – will also be brought into discussion. Previous knowledge of Buddhism is preferred but not required.

Prerequisite(s): No first-year students or by instructor consent.

Crosslisting: REL 328 and QS 328.

WGST 332 - Music and Sexuality (4 Credit Hours)

Considers the impact of a composer's or other musical artist's gender and sexual orientation on his or her creative output by addressing questions such as: Is there such a thing as a queer aesthetic or sensibility in music? What, if anything, do gender or sexual orientation have to do with musicality? Do the gender or sexual orientation of a composer or musical artist matter to listeners? What impact does a musical artist's gender or sexual orientation have on his or her ability to get his or her music performed? And how have the answers to these questions changed over time?

Crosslisting: QS 332 and MUS 332.

WGST 340 - In the Company of Educated Women (4 Credit Hours)

This is a course on women’s educational history in the United States. The scope encompasses some general patterns in women’s educational experiences—as students, teachers, school administrators, and in higher education at particular points in U.S. history. Examining gender issues in historical context allows us to get a handle on how education, ideology, and political economy influence the contours of societies, and limit or extend possibilities for individuals. This course fulfills the Social Sciences.

WGST 341 - Women Creators Across Borders: Rhetorics of Life Writing (4 Credit Hours)

How do women negotiate the challenge of re-composing lives and cultural identities under conditions of geographical dislocation and cultural estrangement? Such self-fashioning requires a strong sense of voice. Yet, both migration and patriarchy challenge the self’s cultural expression: pressures to assimilate rush the stranger into silence, while patriarchal ideologies challenge women’s cultural relevance and claim to a public voice. In this course, we read work by women who have become recognized public voices: Hannah Arendt, Masha Gessen, Nora Krug, bell hooks, and Robin Wall Kimmerer, among others. We explore how their life writing (personal essays, memoirs, and graphic memoirs) becomes a rhetorical tool to evoke the experiences of the displaced, render them intelligible, and theorize transnational and anti-colonial feminist identities. By attending to women’s life writing as resistive and creative engagement, we consider displacement as not only a wound. Rather, we study it as the engine for rhetorical projects of transnational and cross-cultural belonging that articulate more awake, imaginative, spiritual, and connected living-thinking-being.

Prerequisite(s): COMM 280 and COMM 290, or INTL 100 or WGST 101 or consent.

Crosslisting: INTL 255 and COMM 340.

WGST 349 - The Trouble with Normal: Normalization, Discourse and Power (4 Credit Hours)

One of the primary ways that social power and control are exercised is through the establishment and enforcement of "norms": gender norms, racial norms, sexuality norms, norms of able-bodiedness, norms of beauty and body size, and more. Power is both a product of and a forcefield of social relationships, requiring us to attune to the infinitesimal, banal ways in which bodies, beings, and notions of the human are built. Challenging the "mythical norm," this course delves deeply into the theoretical literature of normalization, especially the work of Michel Foucault, and applies it to a wide range of topics including the intersections between sexuality, disability, gender roles, body size, and more.

Prerequisite(s): COMM 280 and COMM 290 or QS 101 and QS 227 or WGST 101 or QS 290 or consent.

Crosslisting: COMM 349 and QS 349.

WGST 358 - Afrofuturism (4 Credit Hours)

This course focuses on the movement, genre, and aesthetic known as Afrofuturism and related concepts such as Africanfuturism and Astro-Blackness. Students will read a selection of critical essays and literature that represent or engage with these concepts and explore media such as film and music. Here are some key questions that the course will try to answer: What is Afrofuturism? When and where did it begin? Is it a national or global phenomenon? What are some of the messages “encoded” in Afrofuturism when it comes to Blackness? How does this genre engage with not only race but class, gender, sexuality, age, and so on.

Crosslisting: ENGL 358 and BLST 358.

WGST 361 - Directed Study (1-4 Credit Hours)

A student in good standing may work intensively in areas of special interest under the Directed Study plan. A Directed Study is appropriate when, under the guidance of a faculty member, a student wants to explore a subject more fully than is possible in a regular course or to study a subject not covered in the regular curriculum. A Directed Study should not normally duplicate a course that is regularly offered. Directed Studies are normally taken for 3 or 4 credits. A one-semester Directed Study is limited to a maximum of 4 credit hours. Note: Directed Studies may not be used to fulfill General Education requirements.

WGST 362 - Directed Study (1-4 Credit Hours)

A student in good standing may work intensively in areas of special interest under the Directed Study plan. A Directed Study is appropriate when, under the guidance of a faculty member, a student wants to explore a subject more fully than is possible in a regular course or to study a subject not covered in the regular curriculum. A Directed Study should not normally duplicate a course that is regularly offered. Directed Studies are normally taken for 3 or 4 credits. A one-semester Directed Study is limited to a maximum of 4 credit hours. Note: Directed Studies may not be used to fulfill General Education requirements.

WGST 363 - Independent Study (1-4 Credit Hours)

Independent Study engages a student in the pursuit of clearly defined goals. In this effort, a student may employ skills and information developed in previous course experiences or may develop some mastery of new knowledge or skills. A proposal for an Independent Study project must be approved in advance by the faculty member who agrees to serve as the project advisor. Note: Independent Studies may not be used to fulfill General Education requirements.

WGST 364 - Independent Study (1-4 Credit Hours)

Independent Study engages a student in the pursuit of clearly defined goals. In this effort, a student may employ skills and information developed in previous course experiences or may develop some mastery of new knowledge or skills. A proposal for an Independent Study project must be approved in advance by the faculty member who agrees to serve as the project advisor. Note: Independent Studies may not be used to fulfill General Education requirements.

WGST 383 - Women's Health in Latine-Chicanx Cultural Production (4 Credit Hours)

This course explores Latine and Chicanx women's health through feminist theories and methodologies. Key thinkers like Gloria Anzaldúa and Cherríe Moraga guide our critique of the socio-cultural constructions of women's bodies and health, promoting an understanding of bodily autonomy, reproductive rights, and intersectional healthcare. Assignments will involve analyzing Latine/Chicanx cultural texts (literature, art, film, media) through a feminist lens, considering how social and cultural factors shape narratives around women's health. We'll examine the diverse experiences of women, especially focusing on race, class, sexuality, and nationality within Latine/Chicanx communities. The course includes comparative studies of cultural representations and acknowledges the importance of localized, community-specific studies to avoid overgeneralizations. Content is grounded in Latine/Chicanx feminist scholarship, encouraging students to engage critically with readings and case studies from leading feminist scholars and artists. Conducted in Spanish.

Prerequisite(s): SPAN 215 or consent of the instructor.

Crosslisting: SPAN 381 and LACS 381.

WGST 391 - Critical Pedagogies: Gender, Race and Class in U.S. Education (4 Credit Hours)

This course explores how education, and particularly schools, can reproduce inequalities as well as strategies for challenging the oppression that many populations experience as a result of the structure of formal education and the social forces that shape it. The course includes a 20-25 hour curricular service-learning commitment in a local school or community organization, which provides opportunities to explore course themes in ‘real world’ classrooms and reflect on these experiences in their coursework. This course fulfills the Social Sciences and Women of Color in the U.S. distribution requirements for WGST majors and the Black Studies (BLST) cross-listed course requirement for WGST majors/minors, as well as the ‘P - Power and Justice’ graduation requirement.

Prerequisite(s): EDUC 213.

Crosslisting: EDUC 390 and BLST 372.

WGST 416 - Women in the U.S. Economy. (4 Credit Hours)

This course will focus on the market and nonmarket contributions of women to the U.S. economy. A historical framework provides the backdrop for examining the economic, political and social institutions that affect women's contributions to the nation's economic well-being. This course fulfills the Social Sciences distribution requirement for WGST majors.

Prerequisite(s): ECON 301.

Crosslisting: ECON 416.

WGST 451 - Senior Research (4 Credit Hours)

Students may enroll in Senior Research in their final year at Denison. Normally, Senior Research requires a major thesis, report, or project in the student's field of concentration and carries eight semester-hours of credit for the year. Typically, a final grade for a year-long Senior Research will not be assigned until the completion of the year-long Senior Research at the end of the second semester. In which case, the first semester Senior Research grade will remain "in progress" (PR) until the completion of the second semester Senior Research. Each semester of Senior Research is limited to a maximum of 4 credit hours. Note: Senior Research may not be used to fulfill General Education requirements.

WGST 452 - Senior Research (4 Credit Hours)

Students may enroll in Senior Research in their final year at Denison. Normally, Senior Research requires a major thesis, report, or project in the student's field of concentration and carries eight semester-hours of credit for the year. Typically, a final grade for a year-long Senior Research will not be assigned until the completion of the year-long Senior Research at the end of the second semester. In which case, the first semester Senior Research grade will remain "in progress" (PR) until the completion of the second semester Senior Research. Each semester of Senior Research is limited to a maximum of 4 credit hours. Note: Senior Research may not be used to fulfill General Education requirements.