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A unified analysis of gender and kinship is considered essential to an understanding of social organization. This course starts from the premise that cultural conceptions of gender are not “natural” categories. In this course we will consider how marriage, family and household organization both reflect and structure cultural definitions of gender and sex-role behavior and…
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Multiple perspectives on the physical, cognitive and psychosocial transitions related to adolescent development. Topics include current versions of developmental theory; specific issues related to early, middle and late adolescence; the adolescent peer culture; sexualities and sex education; multicultural issues in adolescence; and changing male/female roles. Field experience is required (20 hours). This course is cross-listed…
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A course addressing both high-culture and pop-culture romances, from Charlotte Brontë to Harlequin. Works may include Jane Eyre, Daisy Miller, The Making of a Marchioness, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Lolita, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, The English Patient, a Harlequin romance and criticism of romance fiction.
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Film noir refers to a group of films made primarily in the decade or so after World War II and which frequently addressed, in the narrative terms of the thriller, crises surrounding gender, sexuality and race in American culture. The course will investigate through a feminist framework how the sexual politics of postwar films noir…
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In this course we study novels and short stories by contemporary women writers whose work defies traditional literary forms and introduces new modes of expression, whether as narrative experiments, figures of discourse or alternative texts–the body, for example, as metaphor or “text.” We explore how these writers respond to marginalization, subjugation or oppression through literature…
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A study of the dramatic shifts in social, political and economic roles of Italian women in the 20th century, beginning with Aleramo’s famous autobiographical novel, A Woman (1906). Includes the complex treatment of women under fascism; representations of women as wives and mothers; women in the workforce; women’s political victories (suffrage and divorce); personal and…
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A comprehensive introduction to the biological, behavioral, psychological and cultural aspects of human sexuality. Considers the relation of sexual values and behavior; anatomy, arousal and response; sexual behavior and orientation; issues of gender; sexuality through the lifespan; sexual problems; and important social issues such as rape, abortion and pornography. Classroom exercises, films and guest presentations.
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An exploration of the possible biological underpinnings of sex differences in human behavior. Examines the relationship between hormones and the central nervous system in determining how the sexes participate in many different areas of human behavior. Some of the main topics of this course are the sexual differentiation of the brain, how the brain and…
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Multiple perspectives on the physical, cognitive and psychosocial transitions related to adolescent development. Topics include current versions of developmental theory; specific issues related to adolescence and emerging adulthood; the adolescent peer culture; sexualities and sex education; multicultural issues in adolescence; and changing male/female roles.
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A survey of the many ways that the body conditions or is an object of our daily experience and is framed by history, culture, religious tradition, ethnic identity, gender, age and health. Among the topics will be the effects of human physiology and posture on human experience, language, and symbols; the body image and bodily…
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This is a course on feminist epistemology. It examines how various forms of feminist knowledge are constructed and deconstructs notions such as “woman,” gender, gender oppression, patriarchy, women’s liberation, women’s rights and sisterhood. The course examines contentious debates about and among Western, Third World, global, postcolonial, poststructural and transnational feminisms.
