Feminist Theories

Catalog description

This course will introduce students to contemporary feminist theories from different theoretical orientations and multiple disciplines. Our focus though will be primarily western (European and North American) feminist theories. Some of the key questions we will address are: what is feminist theory or what makes a theory feminist? How do different feminist theories understand the category of "woman" and the sex/gender system? How do feminist theories address and complicate the distinction between the personal (or intimate) and the public/political? What alternative forms of knowing/knowledge do feminisms point to and produce? And, most importantly, how do intersecting systems of power or privilege (such as race, class, ethnicity, sexuality, citizenship status and nation) complicate or amplify our understanding of the relation between gender and power? Throughout the course, "we will also connect theory to praxis " as feminist theories encourage us to do so. How do feminist theories challenge us to act differently in the world? And, what material and political changes are imagined for a future feminist world? Readings may include: the Combahee River Collective, Chandra Mohanty, Anne Anlin Cheng, Sara Ahmed, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Judith Butler, Silvia Federici, Lila Abu-Lughod, Gloria Anzaldúa, Donna Haraway, and Patricia Hill Collins.