WGST Courses for Spring 2025
Please click on the course title for more information.
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WGST 104Y 01 - First-Year Seminar: The Body. Reproduction, Sex Education, Work, Fashion
Course: |
WGST 104Y - 01 |
Title: |
First-Year Seminar: The Body. Reproduction, Sex Education, Work, Fashion |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
This course explores the ways in which the body, as a reflection and construction of the self, is tied to social, cultural and political relations. Through this examination of the role that our bodies play in daily life we will delve into the study of gender, race, sexuality and power. We focus on several major areas: (1) after Roe and the medicalization of bodies (contraception, abortion, new reproductive technologies), (2) sex education and the Internet as sites of bodily learning (3) body work (nail salons, surrogacy) (4) the use of the body as a vehicle for performance, self-expression and identity (tattoos, getting dressed). Throughout the course we will discuss how ideas about bodies are transported across national borders and social, sexual and class hierarchies. |
Prerequisite(s): |
None. Open to First-Years only. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Cross Listed Courses: |
SOC 104Y 01 - First-Year Seminar: The Body. Reproduction, Sex Education, Work, Fashion
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Instructors: |
Rosanna Hertz |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 319 Classroom - M 2:20 PM - 5:00 PM |
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WGST 120 01 - Introduction to Women's and Gender Studies
Course: |
WGST 120 - 01 |
Title: |
Introduction to Women's and Gender Studies |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
Introduction to the interdisciplinary field of women's and gender studies with an emphasis on an understanding of the "common differences" that both unite and divide women. Beginning with an examination of how womanhood has been represented in myths, ads, and popular culture, the course explores how gender inequalities have been both explained and critiqued. The cultural meaning given to gender as it intersects with race, class, ethnicity, and sexuality will be studied. This course also exposes some of the critiques made by women's studies' scholars of the traditional academic disciplines and the new intellectual terrain currently being mapped. |
Prerequisite(s): |
None. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis
Language and Literature |
Instructors: |
Jennifer Musto |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 317 Classroom - M 3:45 PM - 5:00 PM
Founders 317 Classroom - W 3:30 PM - 4:45 PM |
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WGST 120 02 - Introduction to Women's and Gender Studies
Course: |
WGST 120 - 02 |
Title: |
Introduction to Women's and Gender Studies |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
Introduction to the interdisciplinary field of women's and gender studies with an emphasis on an understanding of the "common differences" that both unite and divide women. Beginning with an examination of how womanhood has been represented in myths, ads, and popular culture, the course explores how gender inequalities have been both explained and critiqued. The cultural meaning given to gender as it intersects with race, class, ethnicity, and sexuality will be studied. This course also exposes some of the critiques made by women's studies' scholars of the traditional academic disciplines and the new intellectual terrain currently being mapped. |
Prerequisite(s): |
None. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis
Language and Literature |
Instructors: |
Sarah Chant |
Meeting Time(s): |
Green Hall 330 Classroom - MR 11:20 AM - 12:35 PM |
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WGST 202 01 - Trans Studies
Course: |
WGST 202 - 01 |
Title: |
Trans Studies |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
This course introduces the interdisciplinary field of trans studies. We will explore the long history of gender-variant identities and the prevalence of gender diversity in America as well as global societies, leading to the development of "transgender" as a recent social category and phenomenon. In this course we examine the ongoing development of the concept of transgender as it is situated across social, cultural, historical, legal, medical, and political contexts. Drawing on this interdisciplinary framework, we will explore central questions posted by the field of transgender studies. What “natural,” “obvious,” or “timeless” ideas about gender, sex, and sexuality turn out to be none of those things? How does transgender politics intersect or diverge from feminist politics, queer politics, and anti-racist politics? How has transgender studies required that we re-conceptualize the ways we think about bodies, communities, medical science, and media representation? The readings and materials will reflect a range of voices, including diverse forms of scholarship like memoir and manifesto, as well as film, art, graphic novels, memes, and blog posts. |
Prerequisite(s): |
None. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Language and Literature |
Instructors: |
Todd Nordgren |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 317 Classroom - R 6:30 PM - 9:10 PM |
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WGST 205 01 - Love and Intimacy: A Cross-Cultural Perspective
Course: |
WGST 205 - 01 |
Title: |
Love and Intimacy: A Cross-Cultural Perspective |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
This course explores love and intimacy in transnational context. In this course, we will examine the systems of meaning and practices that have evolved around notions of love and intimacy and investigate their broader political significance. We will further explore how love and intimacy are linked to economics, consumption practices, structural inequalities, disruptive technologies, and shifting ideas about subjectivity. If we accept that love, intimacy, and sexuality are socially constructed, how much agency do we exercise in whom we love and desire? How and in what ways do our experiences and expectations of love and intimacy shift as a result of economic arrangements, mobility, and technology? Finally, what, if any, ethical frameworks should mediate our intimate connections, desires, and labor with others? |
Prerequisite(s): |
None |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Instructors: |
Jennifer Musto |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 317 Classroom - MW 6:30 PM - 7:45 PM |
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WGST 209 01 - Queer Popular Culture
Course: |
WGST 209 - 01 |
Title: |
Queer Popular Culture |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
This course explores queer popular culture from music, film, and television to visual art and performance, examining how different representations and understandings of sexuality, gender, sex, and queerness emerge through these cultural productions. We will engage with media from different time periods, cultures, and contexts in order to understand how popular culture and ideas around queerness feed into each other and become constitutive of how we understand our own identities. Topics discussed include race and representation, the “bury your gays” trope, camp, homonormativity, art and HIV/AIDS, queerbaiting, and performances of masculinity. We will explore both the possibilities and limitations of queer representation in media, and uncover what makes some popular culture “queer.” Is it about the subject, the narrative, the politics, or the creators? What is gained by identifying something as queer popular culture specifically? |
Prerequisite(s): |
None. |
Notes: |
|
Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Instructors: |
Sarah Chant |
Meeting Time(s): |
Jewett Art Center 372 Classroom - MR 2:20 PM - 3:35 PM |
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WGST 214 01 - Gender, Race and Health
Course: |
WGST 214 - 01 |
Title: |
Gender, Race and Health |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
This interdisciplinary seminar course examines health inequities in relation to race and gender, as well as class, sexuality, disability, and nation, using an intersectional lens. Intersectionality addresses how multiple power relations and systems of oppression impact the lived experiences of multiply marginalized groups in historical and social context. During this course, we will discuss the historical and theoretical underpinnings of intersectionality and its conceptual, methodological, and practical applications to health topics. We will also examine how mutually constituted forms of social inequality – including racism, sexism, classism, heterosexism, cisgenderism, xenophobia, fatphobia, and ableism – shape health inequities among diverse multiply marginalized groups in differential and compounding ways in historical, social, economic, and political context as well as how multiply marginalized communities have resisted oppression and discrimination and promoted their own health and well-being. This course will address scientific racism, biomedicalization, and population control as well as care, mutual aid, and healing. |
Prerequisite(s): |
None |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Instructors: |
Madina Agénor |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 126 Classroom - R 9:55 AM - 12:35 PM |
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WGST 218 01 - Stage Left: Chicanx/Latinx Theatre and Performance
Course: |
WGST 218 - 01 |
Title: |
Stage Left: Chicanx/Latinx Theatre and Performance |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
This course serves as an introduction to Chicanx/Latinx theater and performance and the role that class, race, gender, and sexuality play in constructing identity on the stage. We will examine how members of the Chicanx/Latinx community-individuals often marginalized from mainstream theater productions-employ the public stage as a space for self-expression and resistance. Through an analysis of plays and theater/performance scholarship, we will identify common themes and important differences in the various productions. We will further consider how community, citizenship, and notions of belonging manifest themselves on the public arena of the stage. We will begin by studying the role of theater in the social justice movements of the 1960s and trace the changes that Chicanx/Latinx theater and performance have undergone in subsequent years. |
Prerequisite(s): |
None |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis
Visual Arts, Music, Theater, Film and Video |
Cross Listed Courses: |
AMST 214 01 - Stage Left: Chicanx/Latinx Theatre and Performance
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Instructors: |
Irene Mata |
Meeting Time(s): |
Green Hall 330 Classroom - TF 11:20 AM - 12:35 PM |
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WGST 221 01 - Gender, Race, and the Carceral State
Course: |
WGST 221 - 01 |
Title: |
Gender, Race, and the Carceral State |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
What is the carceral state? What do girls, women, and transgender individuals’ experiences of policing and punishment in 21st century America reveal about its shifting dimensions? Despite public concerns about mass incarceration in the United States and calls for criminal justice reform, mainstream commentators rarely account for the gendered, racialized, and class dimensions of punishment, nor address the growing ranks of girls, women, poor and gender nonconforming individuals that experience carceral control and oversight. Interdisciplinary in scope, this course critically examines how race, gender, sexuality and class intersect and shape people’s experience with systems of punishment and control. It further explores the economic, social, and political factors that have influenced the development of the contemporary American carceral state and scholarly, activist, and artistic responses to it. |
Prerequisite(s): |
One WGST course or permission of the instructor. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Cross Listed Courses: |
PEAC 201 01 - Gender, Race, and the Carceral State
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Instructors: |
Melchor Hall |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 307 Classroom - TF 9:55 AM - 11:10 AM |
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WGST 224 01 - Feminist Approaches to Research
Course: |
WGST 224 - 01 |
Title: |
Feminist Approaches to Research |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
What is feminist research? What is feminist methods? This course addresses these questions by exploring a wide range of methods of interviewing, ethnography, surveys, archival research, focus groups, and participatory action research from a feminist perspective. The class introduces students to feminist approaches to research from across the humanities, natural and social sciences. The readings for the class explore topics of engaged research and feminist politics of knowledge production. The course focuses on situating multiple methods within feminist epistemologies, and critically examining self- reflectivity among researchers and the ways they influence research. |
Prerequisite(s): |
None |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Instructors: |
Rosanna Hertz |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 305 Seminar Room - W 12:30 PM - 3:10 PM |
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WGST 249 01 - Asian/American Women in Film
Course: |
WGST 249 - 01 |
Title: |
Asian/American Women in Film |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
This course will serve as an introduction to representations of Asian/American women in film beginning with silent classics and ending with contemporary social media. In the first half of the course, we examine the legacy of Orientalism, the politics of interracial romance, the phenomenon of "yellow face", and the different constructions of Asian American femininity, masculinity, and sexuality. In the second half of the course, we look at "Asian American cinema" where our focus will be on contemporary works, drawing upon critical materials from film theory, feminist studies, Asian American studies, history, and cultural studies. |
Prerequisite(s): |
None |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Visual Arts, Music, Theater, Film and Video |
Cross Listed Courses: |
CAMS 241 01 - Asian/American Women in Film
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Instructors: |
Elena Creef |
Meeting Time(s): |
Pendleton East 239 Amphitheater Classroom - R 2:20 PM - 5:00 PM |
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WGST 256 01 - Global Feminisms
Course: |
WGST 256 - 01 |
Title: |
Global Feminisms |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
How does feminist thought and activism from around the world help us recover visions for a fairer world? This course engages with feminist theory and praxis through multiple geographies, including North America, Latin America, Africa, Asia, and the former Soviet Union, amplifying the voices of those who have been erased in a US-centric understanding of feminism. Students will engage with feminist texts, films, and media through collaborative pedagogies. Hands-on assignments geared toward feminist action and engagement will develop students’ critical thinking, writing and public speaking competencies. |
Prerequisite(s): |
Any 100-level social science or humanities course.
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Notes: |
This course can fulfill the requirement of a second course in social theory for the sociology major but is open to all interested students. |
Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Cross Listed Courses: |
SOC 256 01 - Global Feminisms
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Instructors: |
Smitha Radhakrishnan
Banu Subramaniam |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 121 Classroom - W 9:30 AM - 12:10 PM |
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WGST 268 01 - The Healing Art of Reciprocal Care: Visual Arts & Abolition
Course: |
WGST 268 - 01 |
Title: |
The Healing Art of Reciprocal Care: Visual Arts & Abolition |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
The seminar centers the theory and praxis (or everyday embodied practices) of prison abolitionists who engage in reciprocal care, which is how community members take care of each other’s health and well-being, in ways that do not depend on (ineffective) government systems. Students will analyze foundational texts and learn from abolitionist activists. This course explores the contextual nuances of healing arts practices (through case studies) within three Boston-based organizations: Sisters Unchained, serving daughters of (formerly) incarcerated persons; New Beginnings Re-entry Services, providing a home for women recently released from prison; and Families as Justice for Healing, advocating for an end to prisons. The course will explore the healing that emerges from visual arts experiences, including a quilting workshop, an arts course, and web design. |
Prerequisite(s): |
Student must have taken a 100-level WGST course. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Instructors: |
Melchor Hall |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 319 Classroom - TR 6:30 PM - 7:45 PM |
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WGST 302 01 - Global Health and the Environmental Crisis
Course: |
WGST 302 - 01 |
Title: |
Global Health and the Environmental Crisis |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
Social understandings of the relationship between human health and the environment are visible and malleable in moments of crisis, from industrial disasters, weather-related catastrophes, and political conflict, as everyday events like childbirth and routine sickness. But these understandings vary dramatically across time and community. This course addresses the complex dynamics at work in the representations of and responses to health and the environment that emerge during moments of crisis. By studying the way these constructions are shaped by social, political, technological, and moral contexts, we will analyze the role of nature, knowledge, ethics and power in such contemporary problems as human migration, hunger, debility, and disease. The class will together consider the meaning of crisis and how it is shaped by social systems such as gender, sexuality, ability, class, and race. |
Prerequisite(s): |
Open to Sophomores, Juniors or Seniors or by permission of the instructor. A 200 level WGST course is recommended. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Cross Listed Courses: |
ES 302 01 - Global Health and the Environmental Crisis
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Instructors: |
Emily Harrison |
Meeting Time(s): |
Pendleton East 251 Seminar Room - F 9:55 AM - 12:35 PM |
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WGST 307 01 - Seminar: Techno-Orientalism. Geisha Robots, Cyberpunk Warriors, and Asian Futures
Course: |
WGST 307 - 01 |
Title: |
Seminar: Techno-Orientalism. Geisha Robots, Cyberpunk Warriors, and Asian Futures |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
This course examines Techno-Orientalism as a global science fiction genre in literature, film, and social media to understand the broad historical and social formations of Otherness, Aliens, Citizenship, and Immigration. We also study racial assumptions in popular culture, discourses of the human and human rights, science and technology industries, and anti-Asian violence during the global pandemic. Finally, we also interrogate the intersections of race, gender, sexuality, class, and geopolitical divisions and interactions in Asian/American Studies and Postcolonial Studies from the past to the present. |
Prerequisite(s): |
Recommended for juniors or seniors with background in WGST, Asian American Studies, CAMS, Media Arts, East Asian Studies. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Visual Arts, Music, Theater, Film and Video
Language and Literature |
Instructors: |
Elena Creef |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 305 Seminar Room - T 6:30 PM - 9:10 PM |
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WGST 327 01 - Seminar: Intersectional Feminisms
Course: |
WGST 327 - 01 |
Title: |
Seminar: Intersectional Feminisms |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
Emerging initially from legacies of Black feminist thought and articulating the multiple axes along which sexist oppression is experienced, “intersectionality” has exploded into a buzzword within and beyond feminist theory. Despite critiques of intersectionality’s limitations as an analytical concept, the phrase still contains value for feminist thinking and organizing; as Jennifer C. Nash writes, “in the midst of the uncertainties of the everyday, the promise of intersectionality has become even more significant to feminist practice.” This course will look at the many forms that feminism can take through an intersectional lens, tracing and critiquing genealogies of thought and action including trans feminisms, postcolonial and anticolonial feminisms, crip feminisms, indigenous feminisms, and more. Readings will include Nash on rethinking intersectionality, Jasbir Puar on feminism in the service of empire, Marquis Bey on Black trans feminism, and others whose work and activism ignites and engages multiple identities and histories. |
Prerequisite(s): |
At least one WGST course. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Social and Behavioral Analysis |
Instructors: |
Sarah Chant |
Meeting Time(s): |
Founders 305 Seminar Room - T 12:45 PM - 3:25 PM |
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WGST 332 01 - “Rhodes must Fall”: Decolonial and Antiracist Research Methods
Course: |
WGST 332 - 01 |
Title: |
“Rhodes must Fall”: Decolonial and Antiracist Research Methods |
Credit Hours: |
1 |
Description: |
In 2015 a global movement began at the University of Cape Town to decolonize education, research, and tackle institutional racism in academia. This course gives students an introductory engagement of decolonial research practices. Decolonizing research and knowledge means to center the concerns and perspectives of non-Western individuals on theory and research. Thus, this course will be a process of “unlearning” social and scientific standards that we have taken as universal, resisting coloniality in academic production of knowledge, and moving research into action. This course will broadly discuss research methods and praxis in social sciences and in public health/medicine. |
Prerequisite(s): |
At least one 200 level course in the social sciences or in science. |
Notes: |
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Distribution(s): |
Epistemology and Cognition |
Cross Listed Courses: |
AFR 332 01 - “Rhodes must Fall”: Decolonial and Antiracist Research Methods
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Instructors: |
Sabine Iva Franklin |
Meeting Time(s): |
Green Hall 136A Seminar Classroom - W 8:30 AM - 11:10 AM |
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