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Gender Studies Director of Undergraduate Studies: Lauren Berlant, J 422, 702-9936 Program of Study Gender Studies at the University of Chicago encompasses diverse disciplines, modes of inquiry, and objects of knowledge. Gender Studies allows undergraduates the opportunity to shape a disciplinary or interdisciplinary plan of study focused on gender and sexuality. The plan of study, designed with the assistance of a Gender Studies Concentration Adviser, can take the form of a gender-track in a traditional academic discipline, interdisciplinary work on a gender-related topic, or a combination thereof. Students can thus create a cluster of courses linked by their attention to gender as an object of study, or by their use of gender categories to investigate topics in sexuality, social life, science, politics and culture, literature and the arts, or systems of thought. Program Requirements The concentration requires twelve courses and a B.A. research project or paper, which will count as a thirteenth course. The course work is divided into (1) five Gender Studies courses in a major field, (2) five supporting field courses, and (3) two Gender Studies theory courses. NOTE: No more than two of these courses may be reading courses (Gender Studies 29700). A Gender Studies Concentration Adviser is responsible for the approval of any relevant proposal. Major Field. Five Gender Studies courses to be chosen by the student in consultation with the Director of Undergraduate Studies. These can be taken in a single discipline or in closely-related disciplines to develop a gender track within a discipline. Other students might involve gender-focused course work in more than one discipline of inquiry. Supporting Field. Five courses to be chosen by the student in consultation with the Gender Studies Concentration Adviser. Together, these courses provide training in the methodological, technical, or scholarly skills needed to pursue research in the student's major field. Theory Course Sequence. Problems in Gender Studies (Gender Studies 10100 and 10200). Students concentrating in Gender Studies take this two-quarter theory course in their sophomore or junior year. Research Project or Paper. A substantial paper or project to be completed in the student's senior year and advised by a member of the Gender Studies Core Faculty in the student's major field of interest. The paper will be due by May 1 of the student's fourth year, or the fifth week of their graduating quarter. Summary of Requirements Concentration 5 Gender Studies courses in a major field 2 Problems in Gender Studies 5 supporting field courses 1 B.A. Paper Preparation Course (GNDR 29900) 13 Grading. Two of the supporting field courses may be taken P/N. All other courses must be taken for a letter grade. Honors. Students with a 3.25 or better overall grade point average and a 3.5 or better grade point average in their concentration are eligible for honors. The faculty adviser for the senior paper will be invited to nominate honors-worthy papers to a subcommittee of the Gender Studies faculty, which will then make the final decisions. Advising. Each student will have a Gender Studies Concentration Adviser who is a member of the Gender Studies Core Faculty and is chosen from among those listed below. By the beginning of the third year, students are expected to have designed their programs of study with the assistance of the Concentration Adviser. Students may also consult the Undergraduate Program Chair for advice in program design. Students in other concentrations are encouraged to use this listing of faculty and course offerings as a resource for the purpose of designing programs within disciplines, as an aid for the allocation of electives, or for the pursuit of a B.A. project. For further work in gender studies, students are encouraged to investigate other courses taught by resource faculty. For more information about Gender Studies, consult the Center for Gender Studies Web site at http://humanities.uchicago.edu/cgs/ or the Assistant Director at 702-9936. Faculty NADIA ABU EL-HAJ, Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology and the College DANIELLE ALLen, Assistant Professor, Department of Classical Languages & Literatures and the College Leora Auslander, Associate Professor, Department of History and the College Lauren Berlant, Professor, Department of English Language & Literature and the College Carol Breckenridge, Senior Lecturer, Division of the Humanities and the College CATHERINE BREKUS, Assistant Professor, the Divinity School Bill Brown, Associate Professor, Department of English Language & Literature MARGOT BROWNING, Lecturer, the College MICHAEL CAMILLE, Professor, Department of Art History and the College MARY ANNE CASE, Professor, the Law School George Chauncey, Professor, Department of History and the College Kyeong-Hee Choi, Assistant Professor, Department of East Asian Languages & Civilizations and the College BERTRAM COHLER, William Rainey Harper Professor in the Social Sciences, Departments of Psychology (Human Development), Education, and Psychiatry, the Divinity School, the Committee for General Studies in the Humanities, and the College Jean Comaroff, Bernard E. and Ellen C. Sunny Distinguished Service Professor, Department of Anthropology; Morris Fishbein Center for the History of Science & Medicine, and the College Wendy Doniger, Mircea Eliade Professor, the Divinity School, Department of South Asian Languages & Civilizations, Committee on Social Thought, and the College KATHRYN DUYS, Assistant Professor, Department of Romance Languages & Literatures and the College Martha Feldman, Associate Professor, Department of Music and the College Norma M. Field, Professor, Department of East Asian Languages & Civilizations Sheila Fitzpatrick, Professor, Department of History and the College Rachel Fulton, Assistant Professor, Department of History and the College Susan Gal, Professor, Department of Anthropology and the College SANDER GILMAN, Henry R. Luce Professor of Liberal Arts in Human Biology; Professor, Departments of Germanic Studies, Psychiatry, and Comparative Literature; and Committees for Jewish Studies and the History of Culture; and the College Jan E. Goldstein, Professor, Department of History and the College Elaine Hadley, Associate Professor, Department of English Language & Literature and the College Miriam Hansen, Ferdinand Schevill Distinguished Service Professor in the Humanities, Department of English Language & Literature, Committee on the Visual Arts, and the College MELISSA HARRIS-LACEWELL, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science and the College Elizabeth Helsinger, John Matthews Manley Distinguished Professor, Departments of English Language & Literature and Art History, and the College Janet Johnson, Professor, Oriental Institute and Department of Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations ROBERT KENDRICK, Professor, Department of Music and the College Janice knight, Associate Professor, Department of English Language & Literature and the College Laura Letinsky, Associate Professor, Department of Art History and Committee on the Visual Arts SABA MAHMOOD, Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology and the Divinity School Mary Mahowald, Professor, Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology PATCHEN MARKELL, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science and the College Martha McClintock, Professor, Department of Psychology and the College SANDRA MACPHERSON, Assistant Professor, Department of English Language & Literature and the College TRACEY MEARES, Assistant Professor, the Law School Françoise Meltzer, Professor, Departments of Romance Languages & Literatures and Comparative Literature, and the College MARK MILLER, Assistant Professor, Department of English Language & Literature and the College Janel M. Mueller, William Rainey Harper Professor in the Humanities; Professor, Department of English Language & Literature DEBORAH NELSON, Assistant Professor, Department of English Language & Literature and the College Martha Nussbaum, Ernst Freund Professor of Law & Ethics, the Law School, Department of Philosophy, the Divinity School; Associate, Department of Classical Languages & Literatures Patrick O'Connor, Assistant Professor, Department of Romance Languages & Literatures and the College WENDY OLMSTED, Associate Professor, the Division of the Humanities and the College Elizabeth Povinelli, Professor, Department of Anthropology and the College Melissa Roderick, Associate Professor, School of Social Service Administration Lisa Ruddick, Associate Professor, Department of English Language & Literature, Committee on General Studies in the Humanities, and the College Leslie Salzinger, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology and the College saskia sassen, Professor, Department of Sociology and the College Julie Saville, Associate Professor, Department of History and the College BARTON SCHULTZ, Lecturer, Department of Political Science and the College Linda Seidel, Professor, Department of Art History, Committee on General Studies in the Humanities, and the College Michael Silverstein, Samuel N. Harper Professor, Departments of Anthropology, Linguistics, and Psychology (Cognition & Communication), and Committee on Analysis of Ideas & Study of Methods William Sites, Assistant Professor, School of Social Service Administration Laura Slatkin, Associate Professor, Department of Classical Languages & Literatures, Committee on the Ancient Mediterranean World, and the College Amy DRU Stanley, Associate Professor, Department of History and the College JACQUELINE M. STEWART, Assistant Professor, Department of English Language & Literature, Committee on Cinema & Media Studies, and the College RICHARD A. STRIER, Professor, Department of English Language & Literature and Committee on the Visual Arts Katie Trumpener, Associate Professor, Department of Germanic Studies and the College William Veeder, Professor, Department of English Language & Literature and Committee on General Studies in the Humanities Candace Vogler, Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy and the College Martha Ward, Associate Professor, Department of Art History, Committee on the Visual Arts, and the College Elissa Weaver, Professor, Department of Romance Languages & Literatures and the College LISA WEDEEN, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science and the College Rebecca West, Professor, Department of Romance Languages & Literatures and the College IRIS YOUNG, Professor, Department of Political Science Judith T. Zeitlin, Associate Professor, Department of East Asian Languages & Civilizations Courses For a description of the numbering guidelines for the following courses, consult the section on reading the catalog on page 16. 10100-10200. Problems in Gender Studies (=ENGL 10200-10300, GNDR 10100-10200, HUMA 22800-22900, SOSC 28200-28300; GNDR 10100=SOCI 22200). PQ: Second-year standing or higher. Completion of the general education requirement in social sciences or humanities, or the equivalent. May be taken in sequence or individually. This two-quarter interdisciplinary sequence is designed as an introduction to theories and critical practices in the study of feminism, gender, and sexuality. Both classic texts and recent conceptualizations of these contested fields are examined. Problems and cases from a variety of cultures and historical periods are considered, and the course pursues their differing implications in local, national, and global contexts. Both quarters also engage questions of aesthetics and representation, asking how stereotypes, generic conventions, and other modes of circulated fantasy have contributed to constraining and emancipating people through their gender or sexuality. 10100. This course addresses the production of particularly gendered norms and practices. Using a variety of historical and theoretical materials, it addresses how sexual difference operates in the contexts of nation, race, and class formation, for example, and/or work, the family, migration, imperialism, and postcolonial relations. S. Michaels, Autumn; L. Salzinger, Winter. 10200. This course focuses on histories and theories of sexuality: gay, lesbian, heterosexual, and otherwise. This exploration involves looking at a range of materials from anthropology to the law, and from practices of sex to practices of science. M. Miller, Autumn; S. Michaels, Winter. 15600. Medieval English Literature (=ENGL 15600, GNDR 15600). This course examines the relations among psychology, ethics, and social theory in fourteenth-century English literature. We pay particular attention to three central preoccupations of the period: sex, the human body, and the ambition of ethical perfection. Readings are drawn from Chaucer, Langland, the Gawain-poet, Gower, penitential literature, and saints' lives. There are also some supplementary readings in the social history of late medieval England. M. Miller. Winter. 21200. Gender, Sexuality, and Medicine (=GNDR 21200, SOCI 26300). This course examines, from a number of different disciplinary and methodological perspectives, the intersection of gender, sex, and sexuality with the organization and practice of clinical medicine. We are primarily concerned with the manner in which medicine, as a discipline and profession formally grounded in claims to abstracted neutrality, is embedded in a social context, informing and reacting to wider processes such as the construction of gender and sexuality. Our goal is to demonstrate the ways in which medicine has evolved and functions as a site of socially-mediated invention rather than discovery. Many topics relate to women's experience in order to interrogate more generally issues of gender and sexuality in medicine. V. Chang. Autumn. 21300. Victorian Wives, Mothers, and Daughters (=ENGL 21100/40000, GNDR 21300). This introduction to modern theoretical debates concerns the role of gender in Victorian society with a focus on the female gender in history, as well as instructive and medical texts. We begin with readings by Armstrong, Poovey, and Langland. We then concentrate on several contested and much-studied modes of identity: marriage, motherhood, the role of daughters, and related categories such as leisure and labor. E. Hadley. Winter. 21400. Introduction of Theories of Sex/Gender (=ANTH 32900, GNDR 21400). Feminism and sexuality studies have contributed to work in many different regions of humanistic and social scientific inquiry. Some of the most interesting contributions have involved the development of new theoretical frames in which to formulate questions for disciplinary work. This course is intended to be both a survey of some theoretical work on sex and gender, and a sweeping introduction to some of the cultural and social roots of feminism and queer theory. E. Povinelli. Winter. 21600. Eye of the Beholder: Travel, Otherness, and Anthropology (=ANTH 21600, GNDR 21600). If there are basic similarities in the ways travelers tend to perceive foreigners, can anthropology be any more than a sophisticated form of tourism? Would a naïve traveler to the United States today find Americans as odd as Marco Polo found the Mongol? Those are some of the questions this course addresses by way of a close reading of the eyewitness accounts of travelers of various backgrounds, from ancient to present times. M.-R. Trouillot. Not offered 2001-02; will be offered 2002-03. 21700. Body, Gender, and Sexuality (=GNDR 21700, PSYC 21500). This course explores how culturally constructed notions of gender, sexuality, and the body influence psychological development and subjective experience. Readings examine biological, developmental, and cultural psychological approaches to the study of the body. The general aim is to ground theoretical inquiries in clinical case studies, ethnographic texts, and historical materials. We discuss specific cases that challenge essential beliefs about the body (e.g., intersexuality, eating disorders, and body modifications such as female "circumcision"). H. L. Lindkvist. Spring. 23400. Virginia Woolf (=ENGL 23400, GNDR 23400). Readings include The Voyage Out, Jacob's Room, Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse, The Waves, Between the Acts, and selected essays. L. Ruddick. Winter. 23700. Medieval Women's Religious Writing (=GNDR 23700, HIST 19800, RLST 20700). The purpose of this course is to read different types of writing on religion by medieval women to investigate the relationship between gender and genre. We consider hagiography, letters, autobiography, theology, didactic treatises, and visionary writing by individuals such as Baudonivia, Hildegard of Bingen, Heloise, Christine de Pisan, and Teresa of Avila. L. Pick. Autumn. 23800. Staging Femininity: Gender as Spectacle in Opera and Film (=CMST 22300/32300, GNDR 23800, GRMN 23800/33800, MAPH 33500, MUSI 22800/31900). This course explores the relationship between cultural production and gender identity. We read a broad range of texts from contemporary cultural, performance, and film theory (e.g., Judith Butler, Catherine Clement, Mary Ann Doane, Susan McClary, Laura Mulvey, and Slavoj Zizek) and examine a number of symptomatic films and operas where gender norms become apparent through their exaggeration, violation, or suspension. Films by Josef von Sternberg (The Blue Angel, 1930), Busby Berkeley (The Gang's All Here, 1943), King Vidor (Gilda, 1946), Werner Schroeter (Death of Maria Malibran, 1972), Rainer Werner Fassbinder (Lili Marleen, 1980), and Jean-Jacques Beineix (Diva, 1982); and operas by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Marriage of Figaro), Gaetano Donizetti (Lucia di Lammermoor), and Giacomo Puccini (Turandot). Texts in English. D. Levin. Spring. 24800. Gender and South African Writing (=ENGL 24800, GNDR 24800). In this course we develop our understanding of South African writing. A major interest is in the changing social constructions of masculinities and femininities during the period from 1950 to 1990, and the effects of race/racism and class on conceptions of gender. Texts include stories by Can Themba, Gcina Mhlope, Miriam Tlali, and Zoe Wicomb; autobiographies by Noni Jabavu, Ellen Kuzwayo, and Emma Mashinini; and a novel by Nadine Gordimer. D. Driver. Autumn. 24900. Women and New China Cinema (=CHIN 25400/35400, CMST 25400/35400, EALC 25400/35400, GNDR 24900). In this course we study the representation of women in a series of films from different stages of New China cinema. Specifically, we examine a collection of "rural films" (i.e., Li Shuangshuang and Ermo) in which the transformation of a female character constitutes the central action. We explore questions of a film genre, quotations, subjectivity, and the projection of desire. Texts in English. X. Tang. Winter. 25000. Modern Korean Women's Fiction (=EALC 25000/35000, GNDR 25000, KORE 25000/35000). PQ: Knowledge of Korean not required. This course traces the development of Korean women's prose writings in the twentieth century. Its purpose is to articulate the literary, cultural, and political issues that arise from the fictional texts by women. The course begins with extensive reading of Korean female writers, from modern to contemporary, and moves to in-depth reading of the works by Pak Wanso, who has addressed women's concerns intensely in the past three decades. Students with proficiency in Korean are encouraged to read texts in the original. K-H. Choi. Spring. 25100. U.S. Women's History (=GNDR 25100, HIST 27000/37000). This course explores the history of women in the modern United States and its meaning for the world of both sexes. Rather than studying women in isolation, it focuses on changing gender relations and ideologies; on the social, cultural, and political forces shaping women's lives; and on the implications of race, ethnic, and class differences among women. Topics include the struggle for women's rights, slavery and emancipation, the politics of sexuality, work, consumer culture, and the rise of the welfare state. A. Stanley. Spring. 25500. The Politics of Adultery (=CMLT 24600, GNDR 25500, SPAN 25500). This course examines sexual and textual promiscuity in the nineteenth-century European novel. Reading major examples of the novel of adultery (i.e., Flaubert's Madame Bovary and Clarín's La Regenta), we attempt to understand why the plot of female infidelity came to dominate the novel of this period. Placing the works side by side, we explore how Clarín put Flaubert's adultery novel into dialogue with other texts and genres (e.g., the Bildungsroman, the prostitute's tale, and melodrama) to draw out its social and political implications. Secondary readings may include essays by Roland Barthes, Jules de Gaultier, Paul de Man, Jacques Derrida, Sigmund Freud, René Girard, Fredric Jameson, Barbara Johnson, Georg Lukács, Jeffrey Mehlman, Franco Moretti, Ronald Paulson, Tony Tanner, and Slavoj Zizek. Classes conducted in English. E. Amann. Autumn. 25600. Gender and Modernity in Colonial Korea (=EALC 25600/35600, GNDR 25600, KORE 25600/35600). PQ: Knowledge of Korean not required. This course deals with literary, journalistic, and visual texts produced in and about colonial Korea with a view to exploring the construction of masculinity and femininity in the context of colonial modernity. While examining a variety of texts on gender relations produced in Korea, students read selected theoretical writings about gender, modernity, colonialism, and nationalism from other national and racial contexts. K-H. Choi. Winter. 25900. Austen: Emma and Pride and Prejudice (=FNDL 25500, GNDR 25900, HUMA 21600). This course considers two novels by Jane Austen in terms of how they treat gender, class, socioeconomic circumstances, family structure, and geographical places as constraining and facilitating the agency of characters. In responding to change, Austen's characters bridge differences of class, gender, family history, and geographical place to form friendships and marriages that change their self-understandings and capacities for productive social and personal activities. We discuss Austen's representations of evolving selves and how they develop or fail to develop growing powers of agency as they respond to historical and socioeconomic circumstances. W. Olmsted. Winter. 26000. Tough Broads (=ENGL 25500, GNDR 26000). PQ: GNDR 10100-10200. This course is a reading of selected works by some of the postwar era's "exceptional women," as Adrienne Rich defined the term: Simone Weil, Hannah Arendt, Elizabeth Hardwick, Mary McCarthy, Susan Sontag, Joan Didion, and more. Great stylists and often brilliant thinkers, these writers, who mostly came of age before feminism and often had a difficult relationship to it, help us to pose some questions to feminism and so-called post-feminism alike: questions about isolation and community, intellectual authority, personal austerity, pain and suffering, autonomy, and self sacrifice. We very likely juxtapose their work with that of feminists such as Simone de Beauvoir, Adrienne Rich, and Audre Lorde. D. Nelson. Autumn. 26200. Women and Political Theory (=GNDR 26200, PLSC 26200/36200). Enrollment limited. This course reads some of the major writings of modern political theory in which sexuality and gender issues are thematically related to political values of citizenship, equality, and freedom (e.g., works of Rousseau, Wollstonecraft, and Mill). It also reads some contemporary feminist interpretation of these and other modern political theorists. The course then proceeds to consider some works of contemporary feminist political theory engaging themes such as gender and democracy; intersections of gender and racial positioning in politics; justice, gender, and sexuality; and normative analysis of women and public policy issues. Among writers who may appear in that segment of the course are Anne Phillips, Patricia Hill Collins, Carole Pateman, and Anna Marie Smith. I. Young. Spring. 26800. Power, Gender, and Archaeology (=ANTH 56800, GNDR 26800). PQ: Consent of instructor. In this course we address some basic epistomological and methodological problems in historical enquiry, specifically what archaeologists and others interested in material culture can learn about power and gender in the past and how we do (and should) go about addressing them. Although we discuss conceptual parameters of notions of power and gender and review their treatment in the archaeological literature, in the seminar we focus most particularly on method, critically assessing archaeological conventions and systematics, and evaluating the potential for new approaches. K. D. Morrison. Spring. 27100. Sociology of Human Sexuality (=GNDR 27100, SOCI 27100). PQ: Prior introductory course in the social sciences. After briefly reviewing several biological and psychological approaches to human sexuality as points of comparison, we explore the sociological perspective on sexual conduct and its associated beliefs and consequences for individuals and society. Topics are addressed through a critical examination of the recent national survey of sexual practices and beliefs and related empirical studies. Substantive topics covered include gender relations; life course perspectives on sexual conduct in youth, adolescence, and adulthood; social epidemiology of sexually-transmitted infections (including AIDS); sexual partner choice and turnover; and the incidence/prevalence of selected sexual practices. E. Laumann. Spring. 27300. Le Roman de la rose (=FREN 31700, GNDR 27300). PQ: Consent of instructor. The Romance of the Rose, one of the most popular and influential works of the Middle Ages, is a dynamic blending of an eroticism and moral philosophy that recounts the story of a young man's introduction to love. The romance is also a university course on the Art of Love in which writing becomes one of the ultimate forms of desire. Close study of the text, its sources, and reception provide a basis for inquiry into the medieval uses of allegory and irony, the hybridization of poetic genres, the conventions and innovations of poetic authority, the use of classical sources, university disputation techniques, medieval reading practices, and the earliest French literary quarrel on gender and misogyny. Classes conducted in French. K. Duys. Spring. 27700. Pragmatism, Feminism, and Democracy: Dewey and Addams (=GNDR 27700, HUMA 26900, PLSC 27700). Classical pragmatism has been a source for much postmodernist and critical theoretical work of recent decades. This course provides an in-depth examination of the radical democratic potential to be found in the pragmatism of John Dewey, linking his work to the theory and practice of the settlement house movement as represented by Jane Addams. We consider Deweyan democracy in connection with the constructions of feminism, gender, and sexuality at work in some crucial historical contexts of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The course also considers various recent defenses and critiques of the Deweyan legacy, such as those of Charlene Seigfried, Richard Rorty, Richard Bernstein, and Nancy Fraser. Field trips to Hull House and the Laboratory Schools required. B. Schultz. Spring. 28800. Cultural Responses to Human Rights Violations: The Case of Argentina's Dirty War (=GNDR 28800, HUMA 28800). J. Breckenridge. Autumn. 29300. Muñecas de papel: Literatura y fetichismo (=GNDR 29300, SPAN 39300). What magic powers do artworks hold over us? How do they alter our desires? How do they change us when we buy and sell them? Through the anthropological, the Freudian, and the Marxist analyses of the fetish, we examine the melancholy pleasures of writing and reading autonomous literary objects. We read theoretical texts by Marx, Freud, Kleist, and Pietz; fiction, mostly short, by Darío, Gómez Carrillo, Borges, Bioy Casares, F. Hernández, Corázar, Feuntes, S. Ocampo, Sarduy, Ferré, and Peri Rossi. P. O'Connor. Autumn. 29700. Readings in Gender Studies. PQ: Consent of instructor and program chairman. Students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Course Form. May be taken P/N with consent of instructor. This course may be used to satisfy major or supporting course requirements for Gender Studies concentrators. Staff. Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring. 29900. B.A. Paper Seminar. PQ: Consent of instructor and program chairman. Students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Course Form. May be taken P/N with consent of instructor. Staff. Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring.
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