76-241: Introduction to Gender Studies Spring Semester 2012 MWF 9:30 10:20 Scaife Hall 222 Instructor: Sheila

a Liming Email: sliming@andrew.cmu.edu Office: Wean Hall 1309 Box: Baker Hall 245, English Faculty Offices Office Hours: by appointment
Course Description

I consider myself a feminist proclaimed Candace Bushnell, author of Sex and the City, to a Stanford University audience in 2003. I want to teach single women everywhere how to party thats my feminist goal! Bushnells remarks here highlight a few of the conflicts particular to contemporary feminist theory and gender studies. In particular, they illustrate the varying ways in which feminist thought has shifted and changed over roughly the last century and a half. How did mobilization for voting rights turn into a fight for liberal sexuality? How did the efforts of white, Christian women in nineteenth century America beget the radical politics behind queer studies, or black womanism? This course, required for the minor in Gender Studies, provides students an entry point into the vast field of gender studies, and narrates the development of feminist thought in politics, academia, and popular culture. Beginning with the so-called First Wave of feminism in the late nineteenth century, we will proceed to a more in-depth study of 1960s and 1970s Second Wave feminism, and the culture of womens liberation. Here, we will focus on popular voices from this movement figures like Betty Friedan, Adrienne Rich, and Alice Walker in addition to more theoretical texts from the same period. Finally, we will shift to work done in the 1990s and early 2000s, highlighting the emergence of queer and transgender scholarship, and also the rise of global feminism. Throughout the course, we will discuss the ways in which culture responds to these various moments of feminist debate, and students will have the opportunity to devise and pursue research projects specific to their own interests. Course Objectives To introduce students to the major phases and movements of feminist inquiry, including first, second, and third wave feminism, and the major events, figures, and history associated with each of these moments. To make students familiar with the major theoretical and critical positions associated with feminist and gender studies. To permit students the opportunity to analyze, interrogate, and revise such positions from a contemporary standpoint. To encourage students to think critically about gender and sex, and to interrogate their own social practices, customs, and perspectives.

To acquaint students with the method of feminist critique, in order that students may wield this as a method of inquiry in future research or academic engagement. To direct students in research processes, and to provide them a solid critical foundation upon which to form their own opinions, arguments, research topics and criteria.

Required Readings Texts acquired by student (available for purchase at the CMU Bookstore and elsewhere): Freedman, Estelle B. The Essential Feminist Reader. New York: Modern Library, 2007. Friedan, Betty. Anna Quindlen, intr. The Feminine Mystique. New York: Norton, 2001. Rich, Adrienne. Of Woman Born. New York: Norton, 1985. Woolf, Virginia. A Room of Ones Own. New York: Mariner, 2005. Texts provided by the instructor (available on Blackboard): Baumgardner, Jennifer, and Richards, Amy, eds. Selections from Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future. New York: Farrar, Struass, and Giroux, 2000. Bolotin, Susan. Voices from the Post-Feminist Generation. NYTimes.com, 17 October 1982. 4 January 2012 <http://www.nytimes.com/1982/10/17/ magazine/voices-from-the-post-feminist-generation.html>. Butler, Judith. Selections from Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. New York: Norton (2001): 2488-2501. Ehrenreich, Barbara, and English, Deirdre. Selections from For Her Own Good: Two Centuries of Experts Advice to Women. New York: Anchor, 2005. Engels, Friedrich. Selections from The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State. New York: International Publishers, 1968 (1884). Esplen, Emilie, and Jolly, Susie. Gender and Sex: A Sample of Definitions. International Womens Tribune Center, December 2006. 2 December 2011, <www.iwtc.org/ideas/15_definitions.pdf>. Fausto-Sterling, Anne. Selections from Sexing the Body: Gender Politics and the Construction of Sexuality. New York: Basic Books, 2000. Freud, Sigmund. Femininity. Freud on Women: A Reader. Ed. Young-Bruehl, Elisabeth. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1990. 342-62.

Hanna, Kathleen. Interview, Punk Planet. The Cultural Resistance Reader. New York, Verso (2002): 180- 182. Haraway, Donna. A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century. The Transgender Studies Reader, Stryker and Whittle, eds. New York: Routledge, 2006. hooks, bell. Educating Women: A Feminist Agenda. Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center. Boston: South End Press, 1984. Lacan, Jacques. The Mirror Stage as Formative of the Function of the I as Revealed in Psychoanalytic Experience. Sheridan, tr. The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. New York, Norton (2001): 1285-1290. ---. The Signification of the Phallus. Sheridan, tr. The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. New York, Norton (2001): 1302-1310. Lorde, Audre. Selections from The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde. New York: Norton, 1997. Mulvey, Laura. Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. Film Theory and Criticism : Introductory Readings. Eds. Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen. New York: Oxford UP (1999): 833-44. Pollitt, Katha. Feminist Mothers, Flapper Daughters? TheNation.com, 30 September 2010. 2 December 2011, <http://www.thenation.com/article/155100/feministmothers-flapper-daughters>. Rich, Adrienne. Selections from The Fact of a Doorframe: Poems Selected and New 1950-1984. Norton: New York, 1984. Riot Grrrl Is ... Riot Grrrl #6. The Cultural Resistance Reader. New York: Verso (2002): 178180. Rubin, Gayle. The Traffic in Women. Feminist Anthropology: A Reader, ed. Lewin. New York: Blackwell, 2006. Walker, Alice. Selections from In Search of Our Mothers Gardens. New York: Harvest, 1983. Williams, Noelle. Is Lady Gaga a Feminist, or Isnt She? MsMagazine.com, 11 March 2010. 4 January 2012 < http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2010/03/11/is-ladygaga-a-feminist-or-isnt-she/>. Course Procedures Attendance and Lateness Since this is a small discussion class, attendance is mandatory. You are allowed four absences without penalty following your fifth absence, your grade in the class will begin to drop by a half-a-letter grade per absence. Plan ahead if you think you might miss class for religious holidays or for other scheduled events. I do not distinguish between excused and unexcused

absences you are allowed four absences, may they be excused or unexcused, before your grade begins to decrease unless other arrangements have been made with me. Arrive on time. You will not receive an A in this class if you do not arrive on time. Lateness not only disrupts the class but also demonstrates disrespect for your peers and for your instructor. For every two days you are late to class, you will be marked for one absence. If you are more than 15 minutes late to class, you will be marked absent for that day. If you have extenuating circumstances that could affect your attendance throughout the semester (such as illness or a family emergency), it is your responsibility to notify me about your situation and obtain authoritative documentation to excuse your absences (usually from the Dean, your adviser, or doctor). If you miss more than the allotted days due to your situation, we will discuss whether its prudent for you to continue in the course. If you miss class, you are responsible to contact your peers for materials and information youve missed. Thus, it is your responsibility to keep on top of the homework. Do not email me asking whether or not there was a daily assignment. Missing a class is no excuse for not completing the homework. Likewise, I expect you to have read the assigned readings and to be ready to discuss them, even if you were absent the class before. Finally, you are responsible for keeping track of your own absences. A sign-in sheet will be used daily and absences will be thus recorded. Please be conscientious of your class participation make sure you get the sign-in sheet, and please dont expect me to do this for you! Deadlines All written assignments must be submitted on the due date, and missing the class when the assignment is due doesnt mean your assignment isnt late. Turning in an assignment on time is part of doing the assignment, and late work will be graded down, regardless of how well its executed. Lateness penalties are as follows: Papers. For every day that a paper is late, you will lose five points. Daily assignments. All late daily (whether completed in class or as homework) assignments may receive a maximum of half-credit, regardless of how late they are, or the quality of their execution. Presentations. If you miss a scheduled presentation date or are unprepared to present on the scheduled date you may (course schedule permitting) make up your presentation for a maximum of half-credit. Cell Phones, Laptops, etc. Students are expected to participate and be engaged in class discussion. Therefore, students are required to silence or turn off cell phones before coming to class (there is, quite obviously, to be no text messaging during class). All laptops must remain closed unless you have made prior arrangements with me and have demonstrated that using a laptop is necessary for your learning. Failure to adhere to this policy may result in deductions to either attendance totals or class participation scores.

On-Campus Writing Resources International students and non-native English speakers are encouraged to take advantage of Carnegie Mellons Intercultural Communications Center to receive help in preparing assignments. ICC web address: http://www.cmu.edu/icc/index.shtml All students are welcome and encouraged to take advantage of the peer tutoring service provided through the office of Academic Development. Academic Development web address: http://www.cmu.edu/academicdevelopment/ Assignments and Grading Here is an approximate idea of how performance in this course will be assessed: Short Papers (Gender Identity; Woolf; etc.) 20% (30 pts. each) Mid-term Project 20% (80 pts.) Final Paper/Project 30% (100 pts.) Participation daily preparedness, reading, in-class behavior 20% (80 pts.) Daily Assignments in-class writing, short homework responses, etc. 10% (10 pts. each) Guidelines for Submitting Assignments Please note that to receive a passing grade, you must complete all of the major assignments (group presentation/paper, midterm and presentation). All papers, including short response (homework) assignments, must be typed, double-spaced, with 1 margins. Final papers must be submitted both in electronic and paper (hard copy) formats. Electronic format means that papers are submitted through the Digital Dropbox function on Blackboard. Papers must be stapled, paper clipped, or otherwise affixed; if you expect me to be your secretary and do this for you, you will forfeit five points on the paper in question. Include page numbers on all assignments longer than one page. Carefully edit and proofread all texts to eliminate problems in grammar, spelling, and punctuation. Any time you cite an essay, film, book, article, song, website anything, really! you must include a Works Cited page. Works Cited pages should be formatted according to MLA standards and must be accompanied by appropriate in-text citations (NOT footnotes, endnotes, etc.). Documents that do not meet these and other assignment-specific requirements will not be graded. They will be returned to you and, when resubmitted, will be treated as late submissions. Assessing your class participation Since this is a discussion-based course, its important that you participate in class. Participation which includes both classroom involvement and physically being in class

makes up roughly 20% of your total grade. While participation grades ultimately fall to my discretion, often these grades which are not assessed until the end of the term serve to nudge a borderline grade higher or lower. When you contribute to class discussion, be sure that your comments are helpful ones and not tangential to the current threads of conversation. Also, be considerate of your peers, and while disagreement is welcome, please articulate disagreements in a respectful, polite manner. Please note that, in addition to participating in class, participation grades are based on preparedness: come to class prepared to participate by bringing a hard copy of the required text everyday. Digital copies (on your computer, that is) are not acceptable (since laptop use is discouraged in class). Students will be required to have the appropriate text on hand. Failure to comply with this expectation will affect a students grades since in-class writing assignments and quizzes will often require the use of specified texts.

Assignments__________________________________________________
Gender Identity Paper Due: Wednesday, Jan. 18
Instructions: Write a 1-2 pp. paper that grants your reader insight into your gender identity that is, how you understand your gender, what you understand about your gender, where that knowledge comes from, etc. This might require relating the story of a particular event that taught you something significant about your gendered existence; or, it might be more formal, based on essays youve read, theories youve encountered, or perspectives you use to view the world around you. The important thing in this paper is to communicate standards or expectations which you understand to be part of your gender identity, and your thoughts and feelings about those standards/expectations. In addition to your response, you must also do the following: Provide an epigraphic quotation that is, a quote that is placed before your written response in this paper from any source you choose, and that source can come from virtually anywhere. It can be a non-fiction book, a novel, an essay, a poem, a television show, a website, a blog, a song, a movie the possibilities are endless. Provide a Works Cited list for any and all sources to which you refer in your paper, including your epigraph. This list should be formatted according to MLA standards, and should follow the text of your paper. Finally, be prepared to share your paper in class. This may, of course, influence your chosen subject matter. If you are not comfortable sharing certain information or experiences to a group, you may not want to include them as the subjects of your paper.

Assignments__________________________________________________
Virginia Woolf Response Paper Due: Friday, February 10
Write a 2-3 pp. paper responding to Virginia Woolfs A Room of Ones Own. In particular, respond to the text by applying Woolfs 1929 treatise to culture and society today. Consider answering one, or several, of the following questions: What is Woolfs central argument in this work? Or, in the other words, what does she say women must have, and why? What is the significance of having a room of ones own? What does this concept entail, and how does Woolf use it in her work? Do you think Woolfs central thesis still applies today? Do the requirements she outlines in A Room of Ones Own still hold true in our current society? What does Virginia Woolf want women to do? What recourses or methods does she offer in A Room of Ones Own? How does Virginia Woolf feel about the generation of young women beneath her? How does she describe them or characterize them in this essay, and why?

Please use direct quotations from the text to support your answer. And, as always, please provide a Works Cited list including any sources from which you cite information in your paper.

Assignments__________________________________________________
Midterm Group Project: 7th Commercials and Gender-Specific Advertising Due: Wednesday, March

As we have seen already this semester, the so-called second wave feminist movement of the 1960s and 70s expressed concern for the way gendered behavior was represented in popular culture. Critics like Betty Friedan and Adrienne Rich take issue with the way that gendered stereotypes born from socialization are made to appear natural, and styled as innate, essential qualities in both men and women. For this project, you will be working in groups, and analyzing contemporary television commercials with an eye for gender stereotype and representation. Directions: 1. With your group, select one contemporary television commercial (produced and aired within the last 5 years or so) that, to you, seems to rely on gender stereotypes or gender-specific marketing. If possible, find streaming video for the commercial (using YouTube, for example). 2. Prepare a written analysis of the commercial in three parts. All three parts should be submitted as one paper on the day of your group presentation, though individual group members may be responsible for each section. Please note that the completed paper should also include a Works Cited list including entries for all cited material (including the commercial itself, any criticism, commentary, etc.). A) a close reading (1-2 pp.) in which you describe, interpret, and critique the commercial Pay attention to specifics: what product is being sold? Who is the audience (i.e. who is supposed to buy into the product, and the advertising campaign)? What company or brand produces the product? What cultural associations do we have with the company or brand (i.e. do they market typically masculine or feminine products? Do they have a reputation for being a good, trust-worthy, reputable, etc?)? B) an application (1-2 pp.) of critical opinions from our course readings so far Do the stereotypes highlighted in this commercial correspond, for example, to Friedans notion of the feminine mystique? How? Why? If the commercial features a mother, for example, does that representation of motherhood correspond to Adrienne Richs ideas in Of Woman Born? Explain. C) a survey of critical response (1-2 pp.) which reviews any popular criticism / commentary surrounding the commercial Many expensive, high-profile commercials (like those aired during the Superbowl) generate criticism and commentary in the popular press. Others, however, go

relatively unnoticed. Do some Internet research to see if the commercial you chose generated any critical controversy. If so, what do people say about it? What complaints or objections do they raise? If you are unable to find any commentary, why do you think this is the case? Why does this commercial fail to spark any response? What kinds of objections or complaints seem likely? 3. Present your findings and research in class, as a group. Show us the commercial your group chose to analyze; use streaming video or, if you cant find any, see if you can locate images or stills from the commercial, or images of the product. Walk us through the three sections of your analysis close reading, application, and survey of criticism in your presentation. Presentations should be about 5-8 minutes in length, and should involve everyone in the group.

Grading You will receive both an individual grade (based on your work on a section of the written analysis) and a group grade (based on group presentation) for the project. Individual Grade 40 pts. Group Grade 40 pts. _________________ total: 80 pts. (approx. 20% of course grade)

Assignments__________________________________________________
Final Paper Generational Perspectives on Gender and Sex Due: Wednesday, May 9th

Over the course of this semester, weve observed the ways in which perspectives on gender and sex changed drastically from generation to generation. The political aims of First Wave feminism, for example, look very different from those of 1990s Riot Grrrls and Third Wave gender activists. This assignment encourages you to think critically about such generational shifts, and about the ways in which our cultural and social understandings of sex and gender depend upon other systems of belief and thought. Your bottom line in this paper is this: How do collective social views towards both sex (biological difference) and gender (social difference) differ among generations? Feminist thought stresses the significance of the personal alongside the political. For this reason, this assignment asks you to combine personal information taken from yourself, and from interviews with others with critical inquiry and research. Please prepare a 6-10 pp. paper incorporating information from interviews, personal experience, and critical opinion (our course readings this semester). In order to do so, you will need to complete the following steps: Step 1: Interviews Select at least three people who you would like to interview for this paper. Please note that at least two of these people must be from another generation meaning that they must be significantly older or significantly younger than yourself (a generation is usually defined as about twenty years, give or take). Develop a list of 3-4 main interview questions. Decide whether or not you would like to pursue a particular angle to your questions (for instance, perspectives on marriage, on child-rearing and motherhood, on female propriety and manners, on natural distinctions between men and women, etc.). Your questions should be broad, general, and allow for interpretation and development on the part of the interviewee. [For example, if the interviewee is older: Do you think society views mothers and motherhood differently today than it did when you were a young woman?; if the interviewee is nearly the same age as you, How do you think our society views mothers and motherhood today? How do you see mothers represented in our culture now?] Conduct your interviews. Take detailed notes, or record (using a digital recording device) interviewees responses. Transcribe as faithfully as possible so that you may use direct quotations in your final paper.

Step 2: Personal Interview Using the same list of questions you developed for your interviews, write a personal response for each. You will submit the text of your personal interview to me before you turn in your final paper, so that I may gauge your progress and outlook on the assignment. Step 3: Critical Applications Review our course readings from this semester, and identify at least three that seem to ideas discussed in your interviews (including your personal interview). In your paper, you should aim to synthesize personal opinions and critical perspectives meaning that youll want to combine both types of information into a smooth, fluid discussion. Step 4: The Paper Organize the information taken from your interviews and your critical reading. Select main points shared by multiple sources; organize your paper to highlight these main points. Define your argument. You should have a central thesis or claim that you arrived at as the result of your interviews and critical readings. Say, for instance, that you chose to focus on the ways people today view the term feminism as opposed to thirty years ago, in the height of the Second Wave. In pursuing this topic, you asked your interviewees how they felt about the term feminism, and whether or not they might identify as feminists. You found in your interviews that younger generations people your own age tended to have a more positive view of the word as compared to older generations. Your overarching thesis, then, should offer an argument for why you think this might be the case. Your thesis sentence, in particular, could end up looking like this: Young people today, in general, dont bristle at the word feminism, but neither do they seem eager to label themselves as feminists, which is likely evidence of the ways in which Second Wave feminist thought became incorporated into mainstream thinking for the Third Wave generation. Include the text of your personal interview as an attachment to your final paper. Include a Works Cited page, including all your interview sources and your critical readings. Remember that, since you are required to include three interviews, one personal interview, and three critical sources, you should have at least seven sources total for your final paper. Note that, in accordance with MLA, an Works Cited entry for a personal interview should look like this: Schmoe, Joe. Personal interview. 1 April 2012.

Course Schedule
Monday, January 16 Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Wednesday, January 18 Introduction; review course objectives and description; review syllabus and classroom procedures. READ: Esplen and Jolly, Gender and Sex [BB] DUE: Gender Identity Paper (see Assignment Sheet) Submit digital copy (on Blackboard) AND bring hard copy with you to class. Continue to discuss / share gender identity papers; discuss gender/sex dichotomy

Friday, January 20

Unit I: Sex, Suffrage, and the First Wave Monday, January 23 READ: Truth, Two Speeches [EFR] Stanton, Declaration of Rights and Sentiments [EFR] Wednesday, January 25 Friday, January 27 Monday, January 30 Wednesday, February 1 Friday, February 3 Monday, February 6 Wednesday, February 8 Friday, February 10 READ: Anthony, Social Purity [EFR] Goldman, The Tragedy of Womans Emancipation [EFR] Representing the suffragette Review images and clips from films depicting womens suffrage READ: Pollitt, Feminist Mothers, Flapper Daughters? [BB] READ: Freud, Femininity [BB] READ: Selections from Engels, The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State [BB] READ: Woolf, A Room of Ones Own, Introduction, Foreword, and Chapters 1 & 2 READ: Woolf, A Room of Ones Own, Chapters 3 & 4 DUE: Woolf Response (see Assignment Sheet) Submit digital copy (on Blackboard) AND bring hard copy with you to class.

Unit II: Society, Sexuality, and the Second Wave A. Demystifying Gender Monday, February 13 READ: de Beauvoir, from The Second Sex [EFR] Wednesday, February 15 Friday, February 17 Monday, February 20 READ: Friedan, The Feminine Mystique Introduction (Quindlen); Chapters 1 & 2 READ: Friedan, The Feminine Mystique Chapters 8 & 9 READ: Rich, from Of Woman Born Foreword; chapters 1&2

Wednesday, February 22 Friday, February 24

READ: Rich, from Of Woman Born [BB] Chapters 5&7 READ: Rich, poems (Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law; I Am in Danger Sir ; Rape [BB]) Introduce Midterm Group Project Schedule If These Walls Could Talk screening READ: Our Bodies, Ourselves [EFR] READ: Ehrenreich and English, from For Her Own Good [BB] Chapter 8 SCREEN: If These Walls Could Talk location and time: TBA Mid-term Group Presentations Mid-term Group Presentations DUE: Mid-term Group Papers (see assignment sheet) NO CLASS: enjoy your Spring Break!

B. Gendered Bodies Monday, February 27 Wednesday, February 29 Friday, March Monday, March 5 Wednesday, March 7 March 9 - 18

Unit III: Theory, Thought, and Gender Studies Monday, March 19 READ: Walker, Womanism and In Search of Our Mothers Gardens [BB] Wednesday, March 21 Friday, March 23 READ: Lorde, The Masters Tools Will Never Dismantle the Masters House [EFR] READ: Lorde, poems (Now That I Am Forever with Child; To the Poet Who Happens to Be Black ; Kitchen Linoleum; and The Electric Slide Boogie [BB]) READ: Lacan, The Mirror Stage and The Signification of the Phallus [BB] READ: Rubin, The Traffic in Women: Notes on the Political Economy of Sex [BB PLEASE NOTE, the article stored on Blackboard has TWO parts to it. Read both of them!] SCREEN: sections from Whos Counting? (dir. Nash, 1995), in class; discuss Rubin and Warings arguments and the value of womens work READ: Butler, from Gender Trouble [BB] READ: Mulvey, Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema [BB]

Monday, March 26 Wednesday, March 28

Friday, March 30

Monday, April 2 Wednesday, April 4

Friday, April 6

continue to discuss Mulvey, Marilyn Monroe; screen film clips

Unit IV: The Third Wave: Post-Modern, Post-Gender, Post-Feminist, Post-? Monday, April 9 READ: Bolotin, Voices from the Post-Feminist Generation [BB] Wednseday, April 11 READ: Riot Grrrl Is and Interview with Kathleen Hanna [BB NOTE: these two articles are part of one file, labeled Riot Grrrl Is.pdf] READ: Walker, Becoming the Third Wave [EFR] Discuss third wave feminist culture and post-feminist culture Introduce final paper/project READ: from Manifesta, Prologue: A Day Without Feminism [BB] READ: from Manifesta, The Dinner Party [BB] NO CLASS: happy robot appreciation day! DUE: Personal Interview (for final paper); please submit papers via Blackboard, or via email, by 5 PM READ: Haraway, A Cyborg Manifesto [BB] READ: Fausto-Sterling, Male or Female? [BB] READ: selections from Trumpet [BB] READ: Williams, Is Lady Gaga a Feminist? (online) http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2010/03/11/is-lady-gaga-afeminist-or-isnt-she/ DUE: Post a comment to Noelle Williams article on Lady Gaga nothing too lengthy, just a few sentences expressing your opinion. Is Lady Gaga a feminist or not, in your opinion? Wednesday, May 2 Friday, May 4 Wednesday, May 9 Share / present final paper research Course evaluations, wrap-up, edibles DUE: final papers, by 5 PM

Friday, April 13

Monday, April 16 Wednesday, April 18 Friday, April 20

Monday, April 23 Wednesday, April 25 Friday, April 27 Monday, April 30