WGSS 5620: Critical Perspectives on Cisnormativity
Professor Erika Alm
T/R 3:55-5:15P | Mendenhall Lab 0175
This course engages with norms on sex, gender and identity in relation to the pathologization of trans* and intersex people and the scholarly, activist and community work that has grown out of reactions to such pathologizations. As a class, we will explore temporally and geographically situated examples of cisnormativity, as articulated in medical and juridical contexts, but the main focus will be an engagement with the prolific academic and activist work related to trans* and intersex experiences.
WGSS 7702: Feminist Pedagogy
Professor Jill Bystydzienski
T 2:15-5P | 286 University Hall
This course assists graduate students in meeting instructional responsibilities and developing skills for college level teaching.
WGSS 8800: Transnational America
Professor Jennifer Suchland
W 2:15-5P | 286 University Hall
This course will investigate the experiences, circuits and politics of transnational America. Often assumed to be outside of the United States, the transnational actually is situated within and crosses the geopolitical space of the US. Furthermore, "America" is made transnational through myriad political economies, including the making of the Americas through transnational colonial arrangements. In all of these approaches, questions of gender, sexuality, race and ethnicity are central. Possible topics and readings include: Inderpal Grewal, Transnational America; Jose David Saldivar, Trans-Americanity: Subaltern Modernities, Global Coloniality, and the Cultures of Greater Mexico; Erik McDuffie, Sojourning for Freedom: Black Women, American Communism, and the Making of Black Left Feminism; Laura Briggs, Somebody's Children: The Politics of Transracial and Transnational Adoption; Scott Lauria Morgensen, Spaces Between Us: Queer Settler Colonialism and Indigenous Decolonization; and Mishuana Goeman, Mark My Words: Native Women Mapping Our Nations.
WGSS 8820: Feminists Interrogate Violence
Professor Cathy Rakowski
M 11:15A-2P | 286 University Hall
In this course students will assess feminist debates surrounding how to theorize “violence” and how to combat it. Debates include 1) whether specific practices constitute violence or not (i.e., sadomasochism, pornography, sex work/prostitution), 2) whether and how effective it is to use “the master’s tools” (self-defense, weapons, the patriarchal judicial system, etc.) to combat violence against women and LGBTQI persons, 3) whether women’s participation in activities that involve typical patriarchal forms of violence can empower them (i.e., militarism, self-defense with weapons), 4) explaining how some women engage in extreme forms of violence (genocide, torture, suicide bombings), and 5) moving feminist theorizing and activism from the long-term focus on “gendering” violence to a focus that includes “racing,” “queering,” and “transgendering” violence.
WGSS 8840: Nation and Gender in Latin American Visual Culture
Professor Guisela Latorre
R 2:15-5P | 286 University Hall
Scholars in the humanities and social sciences have insisted upon the critical role that gendered ideologies play in the formation of nationalist discourses. Given its history of colonialism, imperialism and hybridity, Latin America has emerged as a rich and complicated breeding ground for nationalist rhetoric deeply steeped in gendered constructs. While these tropes have been forged through various social and political means in Latin America, visual cultural production in its many forms has been a powerful vehicle through which national imaginaries are promoted, disseminated and inscribed upon the social psyche. This graduate seminar is thus dedicated to the perilous history of gender, nation and visual culture in Latin America.