Catalog 2024-2025

Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Minor

Faculty:

Co-Directors: Associate Teaching Professors Firestone and Fryett

Steering Committee: Professor Tillman; Associate Professor Davis; Assistant Professors Clements, Kanjilal, Menzies; Associate Teaching Professors Firestone, Fryett; Assistant Teaching Professor Class.

The Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program is dedicated to promoting research and scholarship through an approach that embraces the foundational notion that gender and sexuality are informed by various social categories, including those that are cultural, political, and economic. Through an interdisciplinary framework – including the fields of Art, Communication, History, Languages, Literature, Philosophy, Psychology, and Sociology – we foster a critical space from which to examine the intersections of oppression, inequality, and discrimination in relation to race, class, age, nation, and ability. Supported by feminist and queer theories among other paradigms, this Program advocates for research and activism in the name of social justice while working to combat sexism, heterosexism, homophobia, racism, classicism, and ethnocentrism. Courses offered engage a variety of viewpoints (including authors of varying social classes, abilities, nationalities, genders, and sexual orientations) and a variety of focuses (including women film directors and the history of sexuality). We also look to broader elements such as global networks of women and transnational feminist movements.

Students who enroll in Women’s and Gender Studies courses will:

1. Compare and challenge notions of gender, gender identity, and sexuality as they are informed by and as they function in various social, economic, cultural, and political contexts.

2. Compare and challenge notions of gender, gender identity, and sexuality as they intersect with race, ethnicity, nationality, class, age, and ability in these different contexts.

3. Learn and employ intersectional frames of analysis in academic research, creative expression, collaborative scholarship, advocacy, and activism.

Degree Requirements

Requirements for Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Minor

WGS 383Women, Gender and Sexuality: Histories and Horizons

4

Total Credit Hours:4

Select Four from the Following Courses (Min. 4 credits must be 300+ level)

ART 323Gender, Sexuality, and Art

4

COM 370Women, Film and Popular Culture

4

COM 435Women Directors: Theory and Criticism

4

HIS 212Witchcraft and Magic in the Early Modern Atlantic World

4

HIS 215Women in American History

4

HIS 229History of Sexuality

4

LIT 238Women's Literature

4

PHL 205Feminist Philosophy

4

PHL 399Philosophy of Sex

4

PSY 404Human Sexual Behavior: Seminar

4

SOC 215Sociology of Sexualities

4

SOC 307Families in Global Perspective

4

SOC 320Sociology of Gender

4

SPA 441Hispanic Women Writers

4

WGS 125Introduction to Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies

4

WGS 290Special Topics

4

WGS 360Special Topics

4

Total Credit Hours:16

(Eight of the 20 credit hours must be at the 300 and 400 levels, including WST 383, which is a required course for this minor.)

Total Credit Hours: 20

Additional courses approved by the program director of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and by the Curriculum Committee may be used to satisfy the Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies minor.