Gender and Sexuality Studies

Academic Year: 
2020-21
Department for Program: 
Philosophy
Address: 
130 Corwin Hall
Phone: 
609-258-1835
Website: 
Gender and Sexuality Studies
Program offerings: 
Certificate
Director of Graduate Studies
Wallace D Best
Graduate Program Administrator
Jackie Wasneski

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 is designed to help graduate students acquire and develop substantive, methodological, and theoretical expertise in the interdisciplinary field of Gender and Sexuality Studies (GSS). That interdisciplinary training is intended to supplement their work in their primary department and to support students whose graduate work engages gender and sexuality studies.

The GSS graduate certificate program is open to students currently enrolled in a Ph.D. program at Princeton University. Students who are interested in pursuing the GSS graduate certificate are encouraged to meet with the GSS Director to discuss their plans before registering. We encourage students to sign up as soon as possible, preferably in their first or second year, and no later than their fourth year.

Courses:

Students pursuing the GSS certificate must complete at least two graduate-level courses. Courses must be offered by or cross-listed with GSS, or otherwise 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.

Students pursuing the GSS graduate certificate must also participate in the student-led graduate colloquium for at least four semesters. The colloquium meets several times per semester. Certificate students are responsible for two formal contributions to the colloquium at any time in these four semesters: 1) present a dissertation chapter, or a conference paper based on dissertation research; and 2) serve as discussant 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

  • Wallace D. Best

Executive Committee

  • Elizabeth M. Armstrong, Schl of Public & Int'l Affairs
  • Wallace D. Best, Religion
  • Javier E. Guerrero, Spanish & Portuguese
  • Brian E. Herrera, Lewis Center for the Arts
  • Tera W. Hunter, History
  • Regina Kunzel, History (fall)
  • Anne McClintock, Gender & Sexuality Studies Pgm
  • Erika L. Milam, History
  • Gayle Salamon, English
  • Dara Z. Strolovitch, Gender & Sexuality Studies Pgm (fall)
  • Wendy Warren, History

Associated Faculty

  • April Alliston, Comparative Literature
  • Bridget A. Alsdorf, Art and Archaeology
  • Leonard Barkan, Comparative Literature
  • Wendy L. Belcher, Comparative Literature
  • Aisha M. Beliso-De Jesús, American Studies
  • Ruha Benjamin, African American Studies
  • John W. Borneman, Anthropology
  • Michael W. Cadden, Lewis Center for the Arts
  • Margot Canaday, History
  • Ellen B. Chances, Slavic Lang & Literatures
  • Zahid R. Chaudhary, English
  • Anne Cheng, English
  • Divya Cherian, History
  • Angela N. Creager, History
  • Maria A. DiBattista, English
  • Brigid Doherty, German
  • Jill S. Dolan, Office of the Dean of College
  • Patricia Fernández-Kelly, Sociology
  • Su Friedrich, Lewis Center for the Arts
  • Diana J. Fuss, English
  • Rubén Gallo, Spanish & Portuguese
  • Reena N. Goldthree, African American Studies
  • Jenny E. Greene, Astrophysical Sciences
  • Judith Hamera, Lewis Center for the Arts
  • Elizabeth Harman, Philosophy
  • Wendy Heller, Music
  • Brooke A. Holmes, Classics
  • Erin Y. Huang, East Asian Studies
  • Alison E. Isenberg, History
  • Amaney A. Jamal, Politics
  • Melissa Lane, Politics
  • Satyel Larson, Near Eastern Studies
  • Russ Leo, English
  • Sarah-Jane Leslie, Dean of the Graduate School
  • Beth Lew-Williams, History
  • Christina León, English
  • AnneMarie Luijendijk, Religion
  • Stephen J. Macedo, Politics
  • Gaetana Marrone-Puglia, French & Italian
  • Tali Mendelberg, Politics
  • Sanyu A. Mojola, Sociology
  • Barbara N. Nagel, German
  • Jeff Nunokawa, English
  • Elizabeth L. Paluck, Psychology
  • Imani Perry, African American Studies
  • Sara S. Poor, German
  • Deborah A. Prentice, Provost
  • Jennifer L. Rexford, Computer Science
  • Carolyn M. Rouse, Anthropology
  • Daniel I. Rubenstein, Ecology & Evolutionary Biology
  • Esther H. Schor, English
  • Janet A. Vertesi, Sociology
  • Moulie Vidas, Religion
  • Christy N. Wampole, French & Italian
  • Judith Weisenfeld, Religion
  • Tamsen O. Wolff, English

Professor

  • Regina Kunzel
  • Anne McClintock
  • Gayle Salamon
  • Dara Z. Strolovitch

Lecturer

  • Alfred Bendixen
For a full list of faculty members and fellows please visit the department or program website.

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.
ART 514 Masculinity & Modern Art (also
GSS 514
) In this seminar we examine representations of masculinity in modern European and American art, exploring how the complexity of gender appears in art and its reception. How did masculinity contribute to artists¿ formal and conceptual concerns, from revolutionary France to postwar New York? Topics include the masculine body, artistic brotherhoods, homoeroticism, historical trauma, the gendered dynamics of the studio, the politics of virility, and psychoanalytic approaches to art history. Readings open onto broader issues of gender, sexuality, and aesthetics, and bring feminist and queer critical approaches to the table.
COM 513 Topics in Literature and Philosophy (also
ENG 513
/
FRE 531
/
GSS 513
) Chance and contingency were long thought to lie outside the realm of knowledge. Then there arose new means for measuring probabilities of the most varied kinds. This seminar will explore the conditions and occurrence of that shift, as well as its consequences, as they are reflected in a few literary and philosophical works.
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 556 African-American Literature (also
AAS 558
/
GSS 556
/
HUM 556
) A survey of African-American narrative and critical traditions in the context of social and cultural change. Attention is also given to the changing status of black literature in the curriculum of American colleges and universities.
ENG 565 The Victorian Novel (also
GSS 565
) A study of 19th-century English fiction, emphasizing social contexts, narrative forms, and critical theory.
ENG 571 Literary and Cultural Theory (also
GSS 571
/
HUM 573
) A study of the role of culture in literary practice and theory. Topics include postmodernism, post-colonialism, feminism, performance theory, queer theory, and popular cultures, among others.
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.
GER 521 Topics in German Intellectual History (also
COM 523
/
GSS 521
) The course examines in their entirety mostly short texts that advance solutions to the intellectual problems preoccupying major German religious thinkers, writers, and philosophers, viz. justification, selfhood, theodicy, play, contingency, asceticism, estrangement, malaise, authenticity.
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.
GSS 543 Interest Groups and Social Movements in American Politics and Policy (also
POL 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.
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.
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.
SOC 529 Gender and Sexuality (also
GSS 529
) This course offers an introduction to theory, perspectives, and empirical research in the Sociology of Gender and Sexuality. The course covers a combination of canonical and contemporary work, consider traditional and current debates, as well as cover US and cross-cultural material. This is a reading and writing intensive class.
SPA 550 Seminar in Colonial Spanish American Literature (also
LAS 550
/
GSS 550
) Intensive study of topics such as Bartolomé de las Casas and the conquest of the Indies; Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz; Neoplatonism and history in El Inca Garcilaso de la Vega; criollo letters and culture (1690-1824); and research methods and literary criticism pertinent to colonial literary studies.