Gender and Women's Studies

University of California, Berkeley

This is an archived copy of the 2014-15 guide. To access the most recent version of the guide, please visit http://guide.berkeley.edu/.

Overview

The Department of Gender and Women's Studies offers interdisciplinary perspectives on the formation of gender and its intersections with other relations of power, such as sexuality, race, class, nationality, religion, and age. Questions are addressed within the context of a transnational world and from perspectives as diverse as history, sociology, literary and cultural studies, postcolonial theory, science, new technology, and art.

The department offers an undergraduate major and minor. It also houses an undergraduate minor in Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) studies, a program whose courses overlap productively with feminist and gender studies. Faculty in the department collaborate with an extensive group of affiliated faculty in Women, Gender and Sexuality, which provides graduate students across campus with a site for transdisciplinary learning and teaching. The department is now in the process of developing a PhD program. The department fosters connections with scholars in feminist and sexuality studies throughout the campus by cross-listing courses, collaborating in research, and participating in the Gender Consortium, which links research and teaching units that focus on gender.

Community-Engaged Scholarship

The Gender and Women's Studies Department promotes engaged scholarship through our unique internship courses. Students commit to working with a community-based organization for a minimum of three hours a week for the semester. The hope and challenge of these courses is to go beyond standard educational models in which learning is bound by the classroom and confined to the University. This effort to bridge the gap between the University—as a place of study—and community organizations—as agents of action, grows from the urgent need for opportunities to engage in a coordinated exploration where theory and action inform each other.

Research

The Beatrice Bain Research Group (BBRG) is the University of California, Berkeley’s critical feminist research center, and is the keystone research program within the Department of Gender & Women’s Studies. Each year BBRG hosts approximately 25 visiting scholars from around the globe whose research is centrally on women and gender. In addition, BBRG organizes public scholarly panels on cutting edge topics in the field of gender studies. Established in 1986 to support and coordinate feminist scholarship across disciplines, the BBRG fosters research on gender and women, and is particularly interested in enabling research on gender in its intersections with sexuality, race, class, nation, religion, post-coloniality and transnational feminisms.

The Gender Consortium is intended to bring together several campus units dedicated to issues surrounding gender and sexuality. The goal of the Gender Consortium is to provide an infrastructure for coordinating public events, fundraising, applying for external grants, and enhancing undergraduate and graduate education.

Undergraduate Programs

Gender and Women's Studies : BA
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Studies : Minor

Graduate Program

The department does not currently offer a graduate program. A Designated Emphasis (DE) in Women, Gender, and Sexuality is offered by the graduate group in Women, Gender, and Sexuality.

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Courses

Select a subject to view courses

Gender and Women's Studies

GWS N1B Reading and Composition 3 Units

Training and instruction in expository writing in conjunction with reading literature. The readings and assignments will focus on themes and issues in women's studies.

GWS R1B Reading and Composition 4 Units

Training and instruction in expository writing in conjunction with reading literature. The readings and assignments will focus on themes and issues in gender and women's studies. This course satisfies the second half of the Reading and Composition requirement.

GWS 10 Introduction to Gender and Women's Studies 4 Units

Introduction to questions and concepts in gender and women's studies. Critical study of the formation of gender and its intersections with other relations of power, such as sexuality, racialization, class, religion, and age. Questions will be addressed within the context of a transnational world. Emphasis of the course will change depending on the instructor.

GWS 14 Gender, Sexuality, and Race in Global Political Issues 4 Units

The production of gender, sexuality, and processes of racialization in contemporary global political issues. Topics and geographical foci may vary. Examples: the post-9-11 situation in the U.S. and U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; Hindu-Muslim conflict in India; the wars in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda; the Israel/Palestine situation; global right-wing movements; state and social movement terrorisms and transnational "security" measures.

GWS 20 Introduction to Feminist Theory 4 Units

Why study theory? How, and from where, does the desire to theorize gender emerge? What does theory do? What forms does theory take? What is the relationship between theory and social movements? This course will introduce students to one of the most exciting and dynamic areas of contemporary inquiry.

GWS 24 Freshman Seminars 1 Unit

The Freshman and Sophomore Seminars program has been designed to provide new students with the opportunity to explore an intellectual topic with a faculty member in a small-seminar setting. Freshman seminars are offered in all campus departments, and topics vary from department to department and semester to semester. Enrollment limited to fifteen freshmen.

GWS 40 Special Topics 3 Units

The findings of feminist scholarship as they apply to a particular problem, field, or existing discipline. Designed primarily for lower division students and non-majors. Topics vary from semester to semester. Students should consult the Women's Studies announcement of courses for specific semester topics.

GWS 50AC Gender in American Culture 3 Units

A multi-disciplinary course designed to provide students with an opportunity to work with faculty investigating the topic gender in American culture.

GWS 97 Internship 2 - 4 Units

Internship Program: Field work in an organization concerned with women's issues plus individual conferences with faculty. Students must present a written scope of work to the supervising faculty members before enrolling. Credit earned depends on the amount of written work completed by students that interprets the experience through diaries, historical reports, and creative work done for the organization. Faculty supervisor and student must agree on assignments.

GWS 98 Directed Group Study for Undergraduates 1 - 4 Units

Seminars for the group study of selected topics not covered by regularly scheduled courses. Topics will vary from year to year.

GWS 99 Supervised Independent Study and Research 1 - 4 Units

Individual research by lower division students only.

GWS 100AC Women in American Culture 3 Units

This course is designed to provide students with an opportunity to work with faculty investigating the topic women in American culture.

GWS 101 Doing Feminist Research 4 Units

In this course, students will learn to do feminist research using techniques from the arts, humanities, social sciences, and sciences. The teaching of interdisciplinary research skills will focus on practices of gender in a particular domain such as labor, love, science, aesthetics, film, religion, politics, or kinship. Topics will vary depending on the instructor.

GWS 102 Transnational Feminism 4 Units

An overview of transnational feminist theories and practices, which address the workings of power that shape our world, and women's practices of resistance within and beyond the U.S. The course engages with genealogies of transnational feminist theories, including analyses of women, gender, sexuality, "race," racism, ethnicity, class, nation; postcoloniality; international relations; post-"development"; globalization; area studies; and cultural studies.

GWS 103 Identities Across Difference 4 Units

The course studies identity as a product of articulation and investigation of self and other, rather than an inherited marking. Emphasis, for example, may be placed on the complexities of the lived experiences of women of color in the United States and in diverse parts of the world.

GWS 104 Feminist Theory 4 Units

Feminist theory examines the basic categories that structure social life and that condition dominant modes of thought. Feminist theory engages with many currents of thought such as liberalism, Marxism, psychoanalysis, postcolonial theory, and transnational feminist theory. In this course, students will gain a working knowledge of the range and uses of feminist theory.

GWS 111 Special Topics 1 - 4 Units

This course is designed to provide students with an opportunity to work closely with Gender and Women's Studies faculty, investigating a topic of mutual interest in great depth. Emphasis in on student discussion and collaboration. Topics will vary from semester to semester. Number of units will vary depending on specific course, format, and requirements.

GWS 115 Engaged Scholarship in Women and Gender 4 Units

This class provides students the opportunity to do supervised community service with an organization that relates to women and gender. Students will be placed in an organization and complete an internship throughout the course of the semester. Students will also spend time reflecting on their internship experiences, connecting their service with concepts learned in gender and women's studies classes, and meeting as a group to evaluate and assess issues such as volunteer/unpaid labor, activism and the academy, and the political economy of gender and women's services.

GWS 116AC Queer Theories: Activist Practices 4 Units

This class will examine various forms of activist practices and create possibilities for students to participate in community projects that allow them to explore their own definitions of activism, community engagement, and social transformation. As a class, we will consider different types of interventions -- art, law, advocacy, and direct action -- and examine the limits and possibilities of these different forms of social engagement.

GWS 120 The History of American Women 4 Units

This course will survey the history of women in the United States from approximately 1890 to the present, a century of dramatic and fundamental change in the meaning of gender difference. We will examine such topics as work, the family, sexuality, and politics and be attentive to variations in the structure and experience of gender based on race, ethnicity, and class.

GWS 125 Women and Film 4 Units

This course explores the role of women both in front of and behind the camera. It examines the socially constructed nature of gender representations in film and analizes the position of women as related to the production and reception of films. Emphasis is on feminist aproaches that challenge and expose the underlying working of patriarchy in cinema.

GWS 126 Film, Feminism, and the Avant-Garde 4 Units

Focusing on the creative process while engaging in critical debates on politics, ethics, and aesthetics, the course explores the site where feminist film-making practice meets with and challenges the avant-garde tradition. It emphasizes works that question conventional notions of subjectivity, audience, and interpretation in relation to film making, film viewing, and the cinematic apparatus.

GWS 129 Bodies and Boundaries 4 Units

Examines gender and embodiment in interdisciplinary transnational perspective. The human body as both a source of pleasure and as a site of coercion, which expresses individuality and reflects social worlds. Looks at bodies as gendered, raced, disabled/able-bodied, young or old, rich or poor, fat or thin, commodity or inalienable. Considers masculinity, women's bodies, sexuality, sports, clothing, bodies constrained, in leisure, at work, in nation-building, at war, and as feminist theory.

GWS 130AC Gender, Race, Nation, and Health 4 Units

Examines the role of gender in health care status, in definitions and experiences of health, and in practices of medicine. Feminist perspectives on health care disparities, the medicalization of society, and transnational processes relating to health. Gender will be considered in dynamic interaction with race, ethnicity, sexuality, immigration status, religion, nation, age, and disability, and in both urban and rural settings.

GWS 131 Gender and Science 4 Units

Examines historical and contemporary scientific studies of gender, sexuality, class, nation, and race from late 18th century racial and gender classifications through the heyday of eugenics to today's genomics. Explores the embedding of the scientific study of gender and sexuality and race in different political, economic, and social contexts. Considers different theories for the historical underrepresentation of women and minorities in science, as well as potential solutions. Introduces students to feminist science studies, and discusses technologies of production, reproduction, and destruction that draw on as well as remake gender locally and globally.

GWS 132AC Gender, Race, and Law 4 Units

Focusing on the interconnected ways that race, gender, and sexuality are constructed through the law, this course will examine a wide range of historical texts, legal documents, literature, and critical theory. Throughout our course readings, we will be focusing on how these categories of difference inform legal constructions of nation, citizenship, immigration, masculinity, femininity, childhood, the public sphere, and everyday life. Throughout the course, we will be making connections between historical events and the contemporary moment through a consideration of interpretation and implications of legal arguments.

GWS 133AC Women, Men, and Other Animals: Human Animality in American Cultures 4 Units

Explores various ways that human groups and interests, particularly in the United States, have both attached and divorced themselves from other animals, with particular focus on gender, race, ability, and sexuality as the definitional foils for human engagements with animality.

GWS 134 Gender and the Politics of Childhood 4 Units

Explores gender and age as interrelated dimensions of social structure, meaning, identity, and embodiment. Emphasis on the gendered politics of childhood--for example, in the social regulation of reproduction; child-rearing, motherhood, fatherhood, care, and rights; the changing global political economy of childhoods and varied constructions of "the child"; child laborers, soldiers, street children; consumption by and for children; growing up in schools, neighborhoods, and families.

GWS 139 Women, Gender, and Work 4 Units

This course uses gender as a lens to examine the nature, meaning, and organization of work. Students learn varied conceptual approaches with which to probe such issues as gender and race divisions of labor, the economic significance of caring and other forms of unpaid labor, earnings disparities between men and women, race and class differences in women's work, transnational labor immigration, and worker resistance and organizing.

GWS 140 Feminist Cultural Studies 4 Units

This course introduces students to the interdisciplinary field of feminist cultural studies. Drawing upon contemporary theories of representational politics, the specific focus of the course will vary, but the emphasis will remain on the intersections of gender, race, nation, sexuality, and class in particular cultural and critical practices.

GWS 141 Interrogating Global Economic "Development" 4 Units

An introduction to women and gender in "development." Addresses theories of "development" (modernization, demographic transition, dependency, world systems, post-development, postcolonial, and transnational feminist): productions and representations of "underdevelopment"; national and international "development" apparatuses; "development" practices about labor, population, resources, environment, literacy, technologies, media; and women's resistance and alternatives.

GWS 142 Women in the Muslim and Arab Worlds 4 Units

Examines differences and similarities in women's lives in the Muslim/Arab worlds, including diasporas in Europe and North America. Analysis of issues of gender in relation to "race," ethnicity, nation, religion, and culture.

GWS 143 Women, Proverty, and Globalization 4 Units

This course examines new patterns of inequality as they relate to the feminization of poverty in a global and transnational context. It will give students the opportunity to enhance their critical knowledge of new forms of globalization and their impact on the least-privileged group of women locally and globally. It also provides an opportunity for students to work with a local or global non-governmental or community organization with a focus on gender and poverty, and to engage in a systematic analysis of the strategies and practices of these organizations.

GWS 144 Alternate Sexualities in a Transnational World 4 Units

This course engages with contemporary narrations produced by and about lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transsexual postcolonial subjects through genres such as autobiography, fiction, academic writing, film, journalism, and poetry. Each semester the focus is geopolitically limited to no more than two countries to allow students to consider the conditions out of which the narrations are produced. Sites and subjects may vary from semester to semester.

GWS C146A Cultural Representations of Sexualities: Queer Literary Culture 4 Units

This course examines modern literary cultures that construct ways of seeing diverse sexualities. Considering Western conventions of representation during the modern period, we will investigate the social forces and institutions that would be necessary to sustain a newly imagined or re-imagined sexual identity across time.

GWS C146B Cultural Representations of Sexualities: Queer Visual Culture 4 Units

This course examines modern visual cultures that construct ways of seeing diverse sexualities. Considering Western conventions of representation during the modern period, we will investigate film, television, and video. How and when do "normative" and "queer" sexualities become visually defined?

GWS 155 Gender and Transnational Migration 4 Units

What economic, social, and cultural forces impel women to migrate and shape their experiences as immigrants? How does gender, together with race/ethnicity and class, affect processes of settlement, community building, and incorporation into labor markets? This course examines gender structures and relations as they are reconfigured and maintained through immigration. It emphasizes the agency of immigrant women as they cope with change and claim their rights as citizens.

GWS 195 Gender and Women's Studies Senior Seminar 4 Units

This seminar is required for all seniors majoring in gender and women's studies. The goal of the course is for students to produce a research paper of 25-30 pages that reflects feminist methods, interpretations, or analysis.

GWS H195 Gender and Women's Studies Senior Honors Thesis 4 Units

Entails writing a bachelor's honors thesis pertaining to the student's major in gender and women's studies. Each student will work under the guidance of a faculty adviser who will read and grade the thesis.

GWS C196A UCDC Core Seminar 4 Units

This course is the UCDC letter-graded core seminar for 4 units that complements the P/NP credited internship course UGIS C196B. Core seminars are designed to enhance the experience of and provide an intellectual framework for the student's internship. UCDC core seminars are taught in sections that cover various tracks such as the Congress, media, bureaucratic organizations and the Executive Branch, international relations, public policy and general un-themed original research.

GWS C196B UCDC Internship 6.5 Units

This course provides a credited internship for all students enrolled in the UCDC and Cal in the Capital Programs. It must be taken in conjunction with the required academic core course C196A. C196B requires that students work 3-4 days per week as interns in settings selected to provide them with exposure to and experienc in government, public policy, international affairs, media, the arts or other areas or relevance to their major fields of study.

GWS C196W Special Field Research 10.5 Units

Students work in selected internship programs approved in advance by the faculty coordinator and for which written contracts have been established between the sponsoring organization and the student. Students will be expected to produce two progress reports for their faculty coordinator during the course of the internship, as well as a final paper for the course consisting of at least 35 pages. Other restrictions apply; see faculty adviser.

GWS 197 Internship 2 - 4 Units

Internship Program: Field work in an organization concerned with women's issues plus individual conferences with faculty. Students must present a written scope of work to the supervising faculty members before enrolling. Credit earned depends on the amount of written work completed by students that interprets the experience through diaries, historical reports, and creative work done for the organization. Faculty supervisor and student must agree on assignments.

GWS 198 Directed Group Study for Advanced Undergraduates 1 - 4 Units

Seminars for group study of selected topics not covered by regularly scheduled courses. Topics will vary from year to year.

GWS 199 Supervised Independent Study for Advanced Undergraduates 1 - 4 Units

Reading and conference with the instructor in a field that does not coincide with that of any regular course and is specific enough to enable students to write an essay based upon their studies.

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies

LGBT 20AC Alternative Sexual Identities and Communities in Contemporary American Society 4 Units

An introduction to varied dimensions of alternative sexual identities in the contemporary United States, with a focus ranging from individuals to communities. This course will use historical, sociological, ethnographic, political-scientific, psychological, psychoanalytical, legal, medical, literary, and filmic materials to chart trends and movements from the turn of the century to the present.

LGBT 98 Directed Group Study for Advanced Undergraduates 1 - 4 Units

Seminars for group study of selected topics not covered by regularly scheduled courses. Topics will vary from year to year.

LGBT 100 Special Topics 4 Units

This course is designed to provide students with an opportunity to work closely with LGBT faculty, investigating a topic of mutual interest in great depth. Emphasis in on student discussion and collaboration. Topics will vary from semester to semester. Number of units will vary depending on specific course, format, and requirements.

LGBT 145 Interpreting the Queer Past: Methods and Problems in the History of Sexuality 4 Units

This course examines interpretive issues in studying the history of sexuality and the formation of sexual identities and communities. Considering primary documents, secondary literature, and theoretical essays, we investigate specific historiographical concerns and raise questions about historical methodology and practice.

LGBT 146 Cultural Representations of Sexuality 4 Units

This course will draw upon a wide range of critical theory, film, music, literature, popular culture, ethnography, theater, and visual art to explore the relationship between cultural forms of representation and individual and collective forms of expression. Central questions for mutual consideration will include: Who/what constitutes the subject of queer cultural production? How are queer theories relevant (or irrelevant) to queer cultural and political practices?

LGBT C146A Cultural Representations of Sexualities: Queer Literary Culture 4 Units

This course examines modern literary cultures that construct ways of seeing diverse sexualities. Considering Western conventions of representation during the modern period, we will investigate the social forces and institutions that would be necessary to sustain a newly imagined or re-imagined sexual identity across time.

LGBT C146B Cultural Representations of Sexualities: Queer Visual Culture 4 Units

This course examines modern visual cultures that construct ways of seeing diverse sexualities. Considering Western conventions of representation during the modern period, we will investigate film, television, and video. How and when do "normative" and "queer" sexualities become visually defined?

LGBT C147B Sexuality, Culture, and Colonialism 4 Units

An introduction to social theory and ethnographic methodology in the cross-cultural study of sexuality, particularly sexual orientation and gender identity. The course will stress the relationships between culture, international and local political economy, and the representation and experience of what we will provisionally call homosexual and transgendered desires or identities.

LGBT C148 Ethnicity, Gender, and Sexuality 4 Units

Course focuses on the production of sexualities, sexual identification, and gender differentiation across multiple discourses and locations.

LGBT 198 Directed Group Study for Advanced Undergraduates 1 - 4 Units

Seminars for group study of selected topics not covered by regularly scheduled courses. Topics will vary from year to year.

Faculty

Professors

Evelyn Nakano Glenn, Professor. Feminist theory, citizenship, women's studies, ethnic studies, comparative race and gender, women of color in the U.S., immigration, labor, critical race theory, transdisciplinary methods, political economy of households.
Research Profile

Minoo Moallem, PhD, Professor. Transnational and Postcolonial Feminist Studies, cultural studies, Visual and Material Cultures of Religion, Immigration and Diaspora Studies, Middle East Studies, and Iranian Studies.
Research Profile

Juana Maria Rodriguez, PhD, Professor.

Charis M. Thompson, Professor. Science & technology studies; environmental ethics; feminist theory; reproductive technology; genetics; stem cell & cloning technology; personalized medicine; biodiversity conservation; transnational studies of reproduction & population; ethnography.
Research Profile

Minh-Ha Trinh, PhD, Professor. Gender and sexuality, women's studies, rhetoric, feminist postcolonial theory, film theory and production, music composition, ethnomusicology, contemporary critical theory and the arts.
Research Profile

Associate Professors

Paola Bacchetta, Associate Professor. Ethnicity, postcolonial theory, transnational feminist and queer of color theories, theories of the inseparability of gender, theories of the inseparability of sexuality, theories of the inseparability of, theories of the inseparability of class, theories of the inseparability of nation, theories of the inseparability of religion, global political and religious conflict (especially Hindu nationalism and racializations of Muslims and Islam), theories of resistance and transgression, right-wing movements, geographic areas of specialization outside the U.S- India and France.
Research Profile

Mel Y. Chen, Associate Professor.

Laura C Nelson, Associate Professor.

Leslie Salzinger, PhD, Associate Professor. Feminist theory, finance, sociology of gender, Gender and Work, Care work, gendering of transnational processes.
Research Profile

Lecturers

Ayse Agis, Lecturer.

Barbara A. Barnes, Lecturer.

Contact Information

Department of Gender and Women's Studies

680 Barrows Hall

Phone: 510-642-2767

Fax: 510-642-0246

Visit Department Website

Department Chair

Charis Thompson, PhD

620 Barrows Hall

charis@berkeley.edu

Vice Chair for Pedagogy

Leslie Salzinger, PhD

606 Barrows Hall

lsalzinger@berkeley.edu

Vice Chair for Research

Trinh Minh-ha, PhD

630 Barrows Hall

trinh@berkeley.edu

Student Services Adviser

Althea Grannum-Cummings

608 Barrows Hall

Phone: 510-642-8513

Fax: 510-642-0246

cummings@berkeley.edu

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