Gender and Sexuality Studies

Academic Year: 
2019-20
Address: 
213 Dickinson Hall
Phone: 
609-258-5430
Website: 
Gender and Sexuality Studies
Program offerings: 
Certificate
Director of Graduate Studies
Regina Kunzel
Graduate Program Administrator
Maria Papadakis

Overview

Gender and Sexuality Studies has a long and rich history at Princeton.  Established in 1982 as Women’s Studies, the program was renamed Gender and Sexuality Studies in 2011 to reflect the trajectory and expanded reach of teaching and scholarship among Princeton faculty and in the field more generally.  Faculty and students in the program are dedicated to the study of gender and sexuality in their complex articulation with race, ethnicity, class, disability, religion, nationality, and other intersections of identity, power, and politics. 

Certificate

Certificate Requirements: 
Program Description:

The graduate certificate in Gender and Sexuality Studies (GSS) offers graduate students who are writing Ph.D. dissertations that engage issues of gender and sexuality to receive a formal credential in Gender and Sexuality Studies.  The certificate will appear on the student’s official transcript after all requirements for the certificate have been fulfilled and a graduate degree has been awarded. Students who earn the certificate are also entitled to list the credential on their curriculum vitae. 

The director of the Program in Gender and Sexuality Studies administers the certificate program. 

The GSS graduate certificate program is open to Princeton University graduate students currently enrolled in a Ph.D. program at the university.  Students cannot be admitted to Princeton University through the Program in Gender and Sexuality Studies as it is not a degree program. Students who are interested in pursuing the GSS graduate certificate are encouraged to meet with the GSS director to discuss their plans before registering. Students register by submitting a form to the GSS program manager, preferably in their first or second year, but no later than the end of their fourth year.

Courses:

Students pursuing the GSS graduate certificate must complete at least two graduate-level courses offered by or cross-listed with GSS, or approved by the program director as a course that meaningfully engages gender and sexuality studies. The following are guiding principles for course selection:

  1. If a department requires degree students to take a certain number of core courses, these cannot be taken to meet the course requirement towards the certificate in GSS.
  2. Beyond “core courses,” if a department requires a designated number of electives, students can use those electives to meet the course requirement for the certificate in GSS.
  3. Of the two graduate-level courses, at least one must be outside the student’s home department.

All students pursuing the GSS graduate certificate are also required to attend the GSS work-in-progress series for at least four semesters. The GSS work-in-progress series helps students develop fluency in GSS theory and methods; it also fosters scholarly community among GSS faculty and graduate students. Attendance is monitored to ensure that students have met this requirement.

Additionally, students pursuing the GSS graduate certificate must also participate in the student-led graduate colloquium for at least four semesters, which meets several times per semester, and they must present a dissertation chapter or conference paper based on their dissertation research at that colloquium, and once serve as a commentator on another graduate student’s work in progress.

Dissertation and FPO:

Graduate students pursing the GSS graduate certificate must complete a Ph.D. dissertation that substantively integrates questions, concerns, and/or methodologies central to gender and sexuality studies, as certified by the program director. To help ensure that this requirement is met, at least one member of the student’s dissertation committee, either a reader or an examiner, must be an affiliated member of the Program in Gender and Sexuality Studies. 

Faculty

Director

Regina Kunzel

Executive Committee

Elizabeth M. Armstrong
Wallace Best
Margot Canaday
Tera W. Hunter
Regina Kunzel
Gayle M. Salamon
Dara Z. Strolovitch
Wendy Warren
Stacy E. Wolf

Professor

Regina Kunzel
Anne McClintock
Gayle Salamon
Dara Z. Strolovitch

Courses

Permanent Courses

Courses listed below are graduate-level courses that have been approved by the program’s faculty as well as the Curriculum Subcommittee of the Faculty Committee on the Graduate School as permanent course offerings. Permanent courses may be offered by the department or program on an ongoing basis, depending on curricular needs, scheduling requirements, and student interest. Not listed below are undergraduate courses and one-time-only graduate courses, which may be found for a specific term through the Registrar’s website. Also not listed are graduate-level independent reading and research courses, which may be approved by the Graduate School for individual students.

AAS 522 Publishing Articles in Race, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (also
COM 522
/
ENG 504
/
GSS 503
) In this interdisciplinary class, students of race and gender read deeply and broadly in academic journals as a way of learning the debates in their fields and placing their scholarship in relationship to them. Students report each week on the trends in the last five years of any journal of their choice, writing up the articles' arguments and debates, while also revising a paper in relationship to those debates and preparing it for publication. This course enables students to leap forward in their scholarly writing through a better understanding of their fields and the significance of their work to them.
COM 530 Comparative Poetics of Passing: Race, Ethnicity, Sexuality (also
ENG 520
/
GSS 530
) The expansion of race theory from the Americas into the global scene invites a cross-cultural approach to the fluidity of identity. This seminar investigates fiction and film from the African American, Jewish American, LGBTQ, and Israeli-Palestinian contexts to broadly explore how society constructs and deconstructs race, ethnicity, and gender. It focuses on representations of passing and reverse passing as well as doubled/split identities for a wide-ranging, comparative discussion of the political and the psychological dynamics of identity and selfhood.
COM 542 Women and Liberation: Feminist Poetics and Politics in the Americas (1960s to the present) (also
GSS 542
/
SPO 556
/
ENG 542
) This course aims to explore different forms that the question of liberation has taken in writings by women philosophers and poets whose work helped to create cultural and political movements in the U.S. and Latin America. Starting in the 1960s, the course touches upon different philosophical concepts and poetic figures that have shaped the language of women's struggles (intersectionality, black and third world feminism, subalternity and feminist epistemologies, capitalist accumulation and "witch"-hunting, (re)transmission of knowledge).
COM 553 The Eighteenth Century in Europe (also
ENG 546
/
GSS 553
) A consideration of the primary topoi and defining oppositions of Enlightenment thought. Texts and specific focus vary from year to year.
ENG 572 Introduction to Critical Theory (also
GSS 572
) The ethical, historical, and political dimensions of Jacques Derrida's thought and writings.
GER 509 Middle High German Literature II (also
MED 509
/
GSS 510
/
COM 504
) Based on one specific text, the first term provides an introduction to language, metrics, manuscript tradition, and textual criticism. The second term deals with special topics in German literature between 1150 and 1450 or interdisciplinary topics such as orality and literacy, word and image.
GSS 501 Questions Across Disciplines in Women's Studies A seminar for graduate students engaged in research in gender studies, examining the guiding concepts and methodologies across the humanistic disciplines. Taught by scholars from different departments, topics include approaches in anthropology, history, literature, sociology, film studies, and political science. Application available in 113 Dickinson Hall.
HIS 519 Topics in the History of Sex and Gender (also
GSS 519
/
HOS 519
) A study of the historical connections linking sex and gender to major social, political, and economic transformations. Comparative approaches are taken either in time or by region, or both. Topics may include family, gender, and the economy; gender, religion, and political movements; gender and the state; and gender and cultural representation.
POL 543 Interest Groups and Social Movements in American Politics and Policy (also
GSS 543
/
AAS 543
) This course engages theoretical and empirical work about interest groups and social movements in American politics and policy-making. We examine theories of interest group and social movement formation, maintenance and decline; how interest groups and social movements attempt to influence public policy; the impact of interest groups and social movements; lobbying; the relationships between interest groups and the three branches of the federal government; interest groups, elections, campaign finance, PACs, and 527s; and the effectiveness of interest groups and social movements as agents of democratic representation.
REL 509 Studies in the History of Islam (also
NES 510
/
GSS 509
) Themes in Islamic religion are examined.
SOC 525 Sociology of Gender (Half-Term) (also
GSS 526
) This course offers an introduction to theory, perspectives, and empirical research in the Sociology of Gender. The course covers a combination of canonical and contemporary work, consider traditional and current debates, and will include local and global material. This is a reading and writing intensive class.