Courses - Fall 2024
WGSS
Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
Open Seats as of
12/26/2024 at 06:30 PM
WGSS105
This course will introduce students to theories of disability justice as they intersect with feminist and antiracist struggles. Tracing the emergence of the concept of disability alongside the rise of racial knowledge since the 19th century, we will consider how disability activists have responded to ableism by developing art, political strategies, and subcultures that promote a more just society built for a wider variety of human bodies. Students will learn about the moral, medical, social, and ecological models of disability; explore varied disability experiences relating to mental illness, chronic disease, and sensory and mobility impairments; debate ethical questions concerning eugenics, selective abortion, health care access, and medical technologies; and analyze the work of disabled artists and activists of color. Students will also discuss principles of universal design which seek to make classrooms more just and collaborative. In order to balance accessibility and community building, the course has been designed for synchronous online instruction complemented by optional in-person sessions.
WGSS200
Introduction to WGSS: Gender, Power, and Society
Credit only granted for: WMST200 or WGSS200.
Formerly: WMST200.
Examines constructions of race, class, sexuality, ability, and gender relations from a social science multi-disciplinary perspective. The course interrogates the ways that systems of hierarchy and privilege are created, enforced, and intersect through the language of race, class, sexuality, and national belonging. The course will provide students with the skills to examine how systems of power manifest in areas such as poverty, division of labor, health disparities, policing, violence. In addition to examining the impact of systems of power, students will reflect on their own location within the exercise of racialized, and gendered power relations. This course encourages students to understand and critique these systems both personally and politically.
WGSS250
Credit only granted for: WMST250 or WGSS250.
Formerly: WMST250.
Provides students with a critical introduction to the ways that art and art activism have served as a conduit to understanding and challenging systems of inequity and practices of normativity. Interrogating the categories of gender, sexuality, race, class, ability, the course will provide students with an examination of how artists have responded to pressing social justice issues of their eras. While the course centers visual art, students will also engage genres such as music, plays, literature, digital and performance art as arenas of social change.
WGSS255
Cross-listed with: ENGL250.
Credit only granted for: ENGL250, WMST255 or WGSS255.
Formerly: WMST255.
Explores literary and cultural expressions by women and their receptions within a range of historical periods and genres. Topics such as what does a woman need in order to write, what role does gender play in the production, consumption, and interpretation of texts, and to what extent do women comprise a distinct literary subculture. Interpretation of texts will be guided by feminist and gender theory, ways of reading that have emerged as important to literary studies over the last four decades.
WGSS263
Introduction to Black Women's Studies
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Cross-listed with: AAAS263.
Credit only granted for: WMST263, AASP298I, WGSS263, AAAS263 or AASP263.
Formerly: WMST263.
Interdisciplinary exploration of Black women, culture and society in the United States. Drawn primarily from the social sciences and history with complementary material from literature and the arts.
WGSS275
Cross-listed with: CMLT275.
Credit only granted for: WMST275, CMLT275 or WGSS275.
Formerly: WMST275.
Comparative study of selected works by women writers of several countries, exploring points of intersection and divergence in women's literary representations.
WGSS277
Careers in the Toy Industry: Gender, Trends, and Social Impact
Credits:
1
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Cross-listed with: ARHU277.
Credit only granted for: WGSS277 or ARHU277.
Exposes students to diverse career options within the $114 billion global toy industry, and will explore the toy industry's relationships to gender and other areas of social impact. Students will learn how careers in play shape our society and about the countless careers in this fun, dynamic field for individuals with diverse, transferable skills. This class will share how emerging trends in content, technology, and approaches to identity and stereotypes shape the industry, its workforce, and its social impact. From Marketing, Accounting, Advocacy and Communications, to Design, Engineering, Law, Supply Chain and Entrepreneurship this is a constantly evolving industry that has the power to shape minds and our world through the power of play.
WGSS290
Credit only granted for: WMST298D or WGSS290.
Formerly: WMST298D.
Explores the contributions of feminist scholarship in framing and resolving contemporary controversies concerning gendered bodies. It includes the ways in which knowledge about the human body has been shaped by cultural ideas of gender, race, sexuality and ability.
WGSS291
Racialized Gender and Rebel Media
Credit only granted for: WGSS291 or WMST298N.
Formerly: WMST298N.
An introduction to the interdisciplinary field of women's studies and an exploration of the ways in which media has been used as a platform for racial justice, feminist activism, and cultural transformation, with a principal focus on the expressions of women of color. The goals of the course are to explore how different forms of media shape the stories which circulate about race, femininities, masculinities, ethnicities, sexualities, religiosity, power and difference, and to examine how various media formats been used to disrupt dominant stories, to tell new stories, and to create differing understandings of citizenship.
WGSS298N
The Politics of Sexuality in America: A Historical Approach
Cross-listed with: HIST289N.
Credit only granted for: HIST289N or WGSS298N.
Why do particular issues about sexuality hold such an important place in American political debates? What animates these controversies and what can a historical perspective on these issues add to our understanding of modern sexual politics? This class explores the historical sexual politics that undergird contemporary debates concerning sexuality in America. It focuses on topics that garner significant public attention - Reproductive rights - LGBTQ rights - Sexting - and explores the histories that undergird Americans disagreements.
WGSS301
Introduction to Research in Gender, Race, and Queer Studies
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Restriction: Permission of the Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Must be enrolled in a Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies program.
Credit only granted for: WMST301 or WGSS301.
Formerly: WMST301.
Primarily a research skills-building course, focusing especially on interdisciplinary approaches to research. Encompasses basic library skills, conceptualizing a research question. The course is not designed to teach a specific research method but rather to as an introduction to a range of research methods commonly employed in feminist, critical race, and queer studies with some opportunity to begin to apply them. Considers the ethical dilemmas and political implications embedded in research projects.
WGSS302
Feminist, Critical Race, and Queer Theories
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, Aud
Prerequisite: 6 credits in LGBT, WMST, WGSS or courses that are cross-listed with these.
Credit only granted for: WMST302, WGSS302 or WMST400.
Formerly: WMST302.
Introduces students to some of the major concepts in feminist, critical race, and queer theories. It examines the questions: What is theory? What forms does theory take? What is the relationship between theory and practice? What is the role of theory in political and social action? In art? In personal life? What does it mean to do theory?
WGSS319D
Workshops in Gender, Race, and Queer Studies; Disability Justice
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
The Disability Collective, a group of Black, brown, queer and trans activists, developed disability justice, an intersectional framework that examines disability and ableism as they relate to other forms of structural oppression. Using a disability justice lens we'll explore debates within academic disability studies, examine historical and contemporary disability movements and modes of organizing, and build a repertoire of skills to engage in direct action as well as social policy and technological innovation using principles of universal design. We will consider a range of social theories centering disabled standpoints: the social model of disability, feminist disability theories, disability critical race theory (DisCrit), and queer crip theory. We'll also explore what it means to live a fulfilling crip life by exploring disability justice within the domains of education, parenting, and sexuality particularly while navigating the mental health and criminal justice systems.
WGSS325
The Sociology of Gender
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Prerequisite: 3 credits in SOCY courses.
Cross-listed with: SOCY325.
Credit only granted for: SOCY325, WMST325 or WGSS325.
Formerly: WMST325.
Institutional bases of gender roles and gender inequality, cultural perspectives on gender, gender socialization, feminism, and gender-role change. Emphasis on contemporary American society.
WGSS336
Psychology of Women
Prerequisite: PSYC100.
Cross-listed with: PSYC336.
Credit only granted for: PSYC336, WMST336 or WGSS 336.
Formerly: WMST336.
A study of the biology, life span development, socialization, personality, mental health, and special issues of women.
WGSS358
Undergraduate Teaching Assistantship
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F
Restriction: Permission of ARHU-Women's Studies department. Repeatable to 9 credits.
Students work under the supervision of a faculty mentor to assist with an undergraduate LGBT or WMST course while also becoming conversant in feminist, critical race, and queer pedagogical debates and approaches.
Students work under the supervision of a faculty mentor to assist with an undergraduate LGBT or WMST course while also becoming conversant in feminist, critical race, and queer pedagogical debates and approaches.
WGSS360
Caribbean Women
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Cross-listed with: AAAS361.
Credit only granted for: WGSS360, WMST360, AAAS361 or AASP361.
Formerly: WMST360.
An interdisciplinary analysis of the lives and experiences of women across the Caribbean region, through an examination of their roles in individual, national, social and cultural formations. Special emphasis on contemporary women's issues and organizations.
Additionally for Fall 2024: Cross-listed with AASP361 and LACS348P. Credit only granted for WGSS360, AASP361, or LACS348P.
WGSS368
Undergraduate WGSS Internship
Credits:
3 - 6
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F
Restriction: Permission of the Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
WGSS378
Undergraduate Research and Creative Works Assistantship
Credits:
1 - 3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Restriction: Permission of the Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. Repeatable to 9 credits if content differs. Formerly: WMST378.
WGSS379J
Topics in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Black Women in Twentieth Century America
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Cross-listed with HIST319X, AMST498D, and AASP398J. Credit only granted for HIST319X, WGSS379J, AMST498D, or AASP398J.
Traces twentieth-century United States history from the perspective of Black women. We will center their diverse voices and experiences as we explore themes including family, work, activism, and cultural expression.
Traces twentieth-century United States history from the perspective of Black women. We will center their diverse voices and experiences as we explore themes including family, work, activism, and cultural expression.
WGSS379U
Topics in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Angela Davis
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Cross-listed with AASP398U, AMST328B, and ENGL368F. Credit only granted for AASP398U, AMST328B, ENGL368F, and WGSS379U.
This course explores the meaning and significance of Angela Davis work for thinking through issues of race, nation, class, gender, carceral culture, and transnational solidarity. Her life and work is set between theorizing histories of race, racism, class, and gender and political organizing and public intellectual work. We will examine all of these aspects by reading her work from its beginning and up through contemporary commentary on incarceration, Palestine, and related issues. The centerpiece of this course will be her study of African-American music in its Black feminist iteration, Blues Legacies and Black Feminism.
This course explores the meaning and significance of Angela Davis work for thinking through issues of race, nation, class, gender, carceral culture, and transnational solidarity. Her life and work is set between theorizing histories of race, racism, class, and gender and political organizing and public intellectual work. We will examine all of these aspects by reading her work from its beginning and up through contemporary commentary on incarceration, Palestine, and related issues. The centerpiece of this course will be her study of African-American music in its Black feminist iteration, Blues Legacies and Black Feminism.
WGSS489
Individual Research in Gender, Race and Queer Studies
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg
WGSS489A
Individual Research in Gender, Race and Queer Studies; WGSS Honors Thesis Writing 1
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F
WGSS489B
Individual Research in Gender, Race and Queer Studies; WGSS Honors Thesis Writing 2
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
WGSS497
Professional Development
Credits:
1
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Prerequisite: 12 credits in LGBT, WMST or WGSS courses.
Restriction: Must have completed a minimum of 75 credits.
Credit only granted for: WMST497 or WGSS497.
Formerly: WMST497.
To assist students in thinking about the next step post-undergraduate degree and to think long term about the importance of their WMST degree in lifelong career, personal, and political development. This course will provide students an opportunity to reflect upon where they are going beyond the B.A. and develop ways to communicate how their coursework and experiences at UMD have prepared them for the next step. The course will focus on the practicalities of resume writing, internship or job searches, etc. but also on the specific challenges/opportunities of translating interdisciplinary training to professional internship or beyond-the B.A. sites. Students may take this course in preparation for their internship (working to select an appropriate internship that can translate well to post-undergraduate aspirations) or they may take it post-internship as they determine their post-graduation steps.
WGSS498A
Advanced Special Topics in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Community Interventions: Domestic Violence I
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Restricted to Psychology or Women Studies majors only. Cross-listing with WGSS498A. Credit only granted for PSYC318D, WGSS498A, or WMST498A.
Theories and researchrelated to domestic violence and interventions with abused womenwill bestudied, and students will think critically regarding ethical andmulticultural issues related to domestic violence. Community resources and strategies for ending domestic violence in the United States will be discussed.
Theories and researchrelated to domestic violence and interventions with abused womenwill bestudied, and students will think critically regarding ethical andmulticultural issues related to domestic violence. Community resources and strategies for ending domestic violence in the United States will be discussed.
WGSS498I
Advanced Special Topics in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Asian American Women and Gender
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Cross-listed with AAST424. Credit only granted for AAST498G, AAST422, or WGSS498I.
Examines Asian/American cultural production along with theories of gender and sexuality in the field of Asian American Studies. We consider how Asian American femininities/masculinities are conceived and circulated, drawing from a diverse selection of twentieth-century and contemporary texts, films and images that connect Asian American bodies to ideas of absence, danger, inscrutability, hyper- or hypo-sexuality, and virulence. Beginning with early to mid-twentieth century representations, the course attends to theories that clarify the contested relationship between the East/West and Asia/U.S. Also examined are the methods through which bodies differentiated by sex, gender, and race are managed, surveilled, and rehabilitated, with close attention to the enduring legacies of American expansionism and conquest, anti-immigration policies in the U.S., and twentieth-century wars and occupations in Asia. The course engages Women of Color feminisms, queer theory, and disability studies.
Examines Asian/American cultural production along with theories of gender and sexuality in the field of Asian American Studies. We consider how Asian American femininities/masculinities are conceived and circulated, drawing from a diverse selection of twentieth-century and contemporary texts, films and images that connect Asian American bodies to ideas of absence, danger, inscrutability, hyper- or hypo-sexuality, and virulence. Beginning with early to mid-twentieth century representations, the course attends to theories that clarify the contested relationship between the East/West and Asia/U.S. Also examined are the methods through which bodies differentiated by sex, gender, and race are managed, surveilled, and rehabilitated, with close attention to the enduring legacies of American expansionism and conquest, anti-immigration policies in the U.S., and twentieth-century wars and occupations in Asia. The course engages Women of Color feminisms, queer theory, and disability studies.
WGSS498Y
Advanced Special Topics in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Dickinson, Erotics, Poetics, Biopics: Some (Queer) Ways We Read Poetry
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
Prerequisite: Two English courses in literature; or permission of ARHU-English department. Cross-listing with ENGL439D and LGBT448Y. Credit only granted for ENGL439D, LGBT448Y, WGSS498Y, or WMST498Y.
WGSS499
Independent Study
Credits:
1 - 3
Grad Meth:
Reg, P-F, Aud
WGSS601
Theoretical Foundations in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, Aud, S-F
Prerequisite: WMST400 or WGSS302; or students who have taken courses with comparable content may contact the department.
Restriction: Must be in the Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies doctoral or graduate certificate program.
Credit only granted for: WMST601 or WGSS601.
Formerly: WMST601.
Examines fundamental concepts in the interdisciplinary field of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. Engages intersectionality as a critical analytic and set of responses to structural power and domination. Provides students with a theoretical foundation for understanding gender, race, and sexuality as analytic categories operating in transnational and global contexts and intersecting with other categories of difference.
WGSS618
Feminist Pedagogy
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, S-F
WGSS619
Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Teaching Practicum
Credits:
1
Grad Meth:
S-F
WGSS628
Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Colloquium
Credits:
1
Grad Meth:
S-F
WGSS698A
Special Topics in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Fascisms
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, Aud
Restriction: Must be in the Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies doctoral or graduate certificate program.
This seminar asks whether and how 'fascism' and 'anti-fascism' might be useful terms for social, historical, and political analysis. From the association of fascism with police violence and colonial domination to the characterization of contemporary anti-immigrant discourses as fascistic, there have been a variety of late twentieth and early twenty-first century invocations of fascism as a rising aspect of political mobilization around the world. What definitions of fascism have been useful to scholars of historical and present-day political movements? What understandings of the body, the human, and the state do the analysis of 'fascism' allow or obscure? How have different anti-fascist mobilizations intersected with (or failed to intersect with) other related social movements?
This seminar asks whether and how 'fascism' and 'anti-fascism' might be useful terms for social, historical, and political analysis. From the association of fascism with police violence and colonial domination to the characterization of contemporary anti-immigrant discourses as fascistic, there have been a variety of late twentieth and early twenty-first century invocations of fascism as a rising aspect of political mobilization around the world. What definitions of fascism have been useful to scholars of historical and present-day political movements? What understandings of the body, the human, and the state do the analysis of 'fascism' allow or obscure? How have different anti-fascist mobilizations intersected with (or failed to intersect with) other related social movements?
WGSS698E
Special Topics in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Race and Media Theory and Practice
Credits:
3
Grad Meth:
Reg, Aud
Restriction: Permission of instructor. Cross-listed with WMST698E. Credit only granted for AMST628C or WMST698E.
This class looks at foundational and new interdisciplinary scholarship on race and media. The course will explore topics such as media production, distribution, markets, representation, and audiences.
This class looks at foundational and new interdisciplinary scholarship on race and media. The course will explore topics such as media production, distribution, markets, representation, and audiences.
WGSS699
Independent Study
Credits:
1 - 3
Grad Meth:
Reg, Aud
WGSS709
Directed Independent Reading for Major Field Exam
Credits:
1 - 6
Grad Meth:
S-F
WGSS799
Masters Thesis Research
Credits:
1 - 6
Grad Meth:
S-F
WGSS898
Pre-Candidacy Research
Credits:
1 - 8
Grad Meth:
Reg, S-F
WGSS899
Doctoral Dissertation Research
Credits:
1 - 8
Grad Meth:
S-F
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