Degree Offered: B.A.

This undergraduate major takes an interdisciplinary approach in its exploration of women's experiences and the role that ideas about sexual differences have played in human societies. Areas of inquiry include women's participation in social and cultural production; the construction of gender roles and sexuality; the relationship between ideas about gender and concepts inherent in other social, political, and legal structures; and the implications of feminist theory for philosophical and epistemological traditions.

Students acquire an understanding of how adopting gender as a significant category of analysis challenges existing disciplines. They also gain proficiency in the methods used to study and compare cultural constructions of gender and sexuality, and they become familiar with the ongoing fundamental debates in women's and gender studies.

The requirements for the major are designed with these expectations in mind.

Degree Requirements: B.A.in Study of Women & Gender

For general university requirements, see Graduation Requirements in the current General Announcements.

Students majoring in the study of women & gender must complete:

• 36 semester hours of departmental course work (30 hours if as a second major)
• WGST 101 Introduction to the Study of Women & Gender OR WGST 201 Introduction to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, & Transgender Studies
• At least one course in critical race studies
• At least one course in non-Western studies
• At least one approved theory course
• WGST 498 Capstone: Research in the Study of Women & Gender (fall) AND
• WGST 499 Capstone: Research in the Study of Women & Gender (spring)

Of the six (6) remaining required courses, no more than four (4) may be from a single department. All students must work out their individual courses of study with their faculty advisers. Each student's planned course of study will be reviewed and approved by the director.

Please refer to the Complete Course Offerings, or the current academic year course lists, to review those courses that can be used to fulfull major requirements for the major. As course offerings may vary from year to year, students are urged to consult with their faculty advisers or with the director at the beginning of each semester.

CAPSTONE REQUIREMENTS

This project has three components, beginning in the late spring of the junior year.

1) In that spring semester, the student chooses an advisor from the SWG faculty and, with that advisor, produces a proposal for a research project. The proposal must be approved by the SWG steering committee by the last day of exam period in the spring of the junior year.

2) In the fall of the senior year, the student enrolls in WGST 498, the SWG capstone course and research workshop in which senior majors come together once weekly as a research group facilitated by the SWG Director. Students work on their research project in consultation with their advisor, then report weekly on that project in group. Group meetings can involve the reading of materials for the various developing projects as well as the presentation of draft material. Students will learn to critique the work of fellow capstone students as well as to pose questions and solicit feedback for their own work. Although the course will involve working with student writing throughout the semester, the final requirement of the course will be a detailed outline of the project as well as a polished sample section.

3) In the spring of the senior year, the student enrolls in WGST 499, an independent study with the advisor, in order to complete the research project due March 15. The student, along with other participants in 498/499, presents the project at a meeting of SWG faculty and majors.

The SWG steering committee will consider exceptions to and modification of the research plan as outlined above.  Students who need to accommodate a different schedule of capstone completion should submit a written proposal to the committee by the midpoint of the semester immediately preceding the semester in which the student proposes beginning the project.  This proposal should include an itinerary and due dates for the capstone (planned by the student in concert with their chosen advisor to make sure the advisor's schedule can accommodate the student's chosen deadlines), and an articulation of why the revised schedule is necessary, which might include December degree completion or other career considerations.

Updated December 9, 2004  AWW

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