The purpose of the major is to provide students with interdisciplinary breadth; however, we also encourage students to work with their faculty advisors to formulate their coursework around issues or themes of particular interest.
Additional electives are available each semester.
The Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies major is thirty-three (33) credits.
Course Requirements for the Major:
1). Foundation courses (all are required):
WGST 101: Introduction to Women’s Studies
WGST 102:
PHIL 220: Introduction to Feminism
2). Methods course (one is required): In order to provide the necessary methodological background for advanced study, each student will take an approved methods course in a discipline related to her/his interests.
Approved methods courses include:
AMST 201: Introduction to American Studies
ARTH 303: Methods of Art History
ENGL 295: Methods of Advanced Literary Studies
HISP 205: Documentation and Fieldwork
HIST 299: Introduction to the Study of History
PSCI 291: Research and Writing in Political Science
PSYC 362: Research Methods for Psychology
SOCG 364 Quantitative or Qualitative Methods or 365: and Analysis
SOCG 475: Public Sociology
3) Electives: Students will take 6 electives from at least 3 different disciplines, reflecting the interdisciplinary nature of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. One of the electives must emphasize difference in the form of race, class, ethnicity, religion, disability, age, or sexuality. The permanent list of electives appears below. An additional list of electives will be circulated by the program director each semester.
To qualify as an elective, the content of a course must be predominately about women and/or gender. A student may request that a course be approved as an elective for the major by presenting a syllabus and an acknowledgement from the professor that the course meets that standard; however, that request must be made to the program director before the beginning of the semester in which the course is taken. Further instructions are available on this website.
Courses approved as electives for the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies major include:
AMST 305: American Gender and Sexuality
ANTH 212: Anthropology of Gender
ARTH 460: Women and Western Art
CLAS 310: Women in Antiquity
COMM 376: Gender and Communication
ENGL 243: Women in Literature
ENGL 318: Sex, Love, and Power in Renaissance England
ENGL 327: Jane Austen
ENGL 332: British Romantic Women Poets
ENGL 353: Asian American Literature
ENGL 369: Women and Modernism
ENGL 468: Feminist Literary Theories and Criticism
HIST 326: History of Manhood in the US
HIST 327: US Women’s History to 1870
HIST 328: US Women’s History since 1870
HIST 334: Early Modern European Women’s History
HIST 368: Gender in Chinese History
HIST 396: History of Sexuality in the US
HIST 462: Women in Latin America
LING 307: Language and Gender
PHIL 350: Feminist Theory and Philosophy
PSCI 370: Women and Politics
PSCI 372: Gender and Development
PSYC 349: Psychology of Human Sexuality
PSYC 350: Psychology of Women
RELG 303: Sex, Gender, and Religion in America
RELG 310: Women and Sexuality in the Western Religious Tradition
SOCG 304: Social Stratification
SOCG 315: Gender and Society
SOCG 331: The Family
SOCG 400: Sociology of the Body
SOCG 434: Gender and Work
SPAN 475: Hispanic Women Writers
THEA 250: Fashion History
WGST 102: Perspectives in Sexuality
WGST 300: Special Topics in Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies
WGST 400: Seminar in Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies
WGST 491: Independent Study
WGST 499: Internship
(This list will be updated as new courses are added to the catalog.)
4) Capstone course (one is required): For the capstone experience, all majors will design a capstone project (WGST 485) under the supervision of an affiliated faculty member. The student will submit a proposal for the 485 project for approval by a committee composed of the program director, the student’s faculty advisor, and the WGST advisory committee; the proposal must be submitted to the committee the semester before it is to be completed. The project provides students with the opportunity to engage in the creation of original material and to apply the methods and approaches that they have acquired in the major. More information is available at the program’s website.
NOTE: Students are responsible for meeting any departmental prerequisites for all classes.