Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies

BACHELOR OF ARTS

On this page: Major Description | Requirements | Learning Objectives| Faculty & Staff | Recommended Preparation | Graduate school prep tips from Faculty

Follow your passion for helping people, serving the community, and improving the lives of those in need!

Do courses like Rad Women of the Global South and Economics of Gender sound exciting to you? Do you want to explore a career in Non-Profit Organizations, Education or Law?

The Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies (GWSS) major at the University of Washington Bothell offers students the opportunity to examine social and political realities shaped by gender, sexuality, and power. Students approach topics from transnational and intersectional perspectives, enabling students to analyze and address issues of gender, sexuality, and social difference at personal, historical, institutional, and structural levels.

Purpose

Students in the Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies major are passionate about understanding gender and sexuality as they intersect with race, class, ethnicity, nation, ability, cisgender privilege and other forms of power. Students often ask, Whose voices and histories are we not hearing, and why?

Practice

Courses in the Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies major focus on the texts, histories, and experiences from the Global North and South. Visibility is brought to many kinds of feminist knowledge production such as women of color feminism, transfeminism, queer feminism, feminist science and technology studies, and more.

Profession

Graduates of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies major are prepared for careers in community-based non-profit organizations, law, education, social services, the arts, and a variety of other sectors including graduate schools. Employers highly value their ability to work with diverse communities.

Major requirements

Recommended preparation

Interested in exploring this major but not ready to commit? Consider taking one of the below courses! Any of these selections will help familiarize you with the academic program and prepare you for advanced coursework in the major.

• BIS 219 Politics of Sex Education
• BIS 222 Introduction to Human Sexuality
• BIS 224 Introduction to Feminist Studies
• BIS 227 Rad Women in the Global South

Prerequisites

While there are no official prerequisites beyond the requirements for admission into the School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences, students choosing this major will find it especially helpful to have completed college coursework in feminist studies, history and culture, sociology, or literature.

Degree requirements

• BIS 300 Interdisciplinary Inquiry* – min. 2.0 grade (5 credits)
• BISGWS 301 Critical Gender and Sexuality Studies (5 credits)
• BISGWS 302 Histories and Movements of Gender and Sexuality or BISGWS 303** Approaches to Feminist Inquiry (5 credits)
• GWSS Coursework (30 credits)
• BIS 499 Portfolio Capstone – min. 2.5 grade (5 credits)
• Additional IAS Coursework (20 credits)

TOTAL = 70 Credits

* Should be taken in the first quarter of IAS enrollment.
** GWSS faculty HIGHLY recommend students take both BISGWS 302 & 303. If a student completes both BISGWS 302 and BISGWS 303, 5 credits from these courses can be applied toward the student’s GWSS coursework requirement.

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Learning objectives

The Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies curriculum advances the five core IAS learning objectives. Students majoring or minoring in Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies will be able to:

1. Think critically about the operation of gender and sexuality at personal, institutional, and structural levels.
2. Situate and analyze gender and sexuality at local, national, and transnational levels.
3. Critically examine the intersection of gender and sexuality with other vectors of identity, power, and privilege such as race, ethnicity, nationality, class, age, and dis/ability.
4. Undertake critical interdisciplinary research that understands the role of cultural norms and assumptions especially, but not limited to, gender and sexuality in knowledge production.
5. Collaborate with peers and off campus communities to engage in scholarly and creative activities that intervene in existing debates and create new ways of engaging issues of gender and sexuality.
6. Write and communicate clearly about feminist theories and manifestations of power and resistance.

People

Faculty

• Alka Kurian
  Faculty Coordinator
• Anida Yoeu Ali
• Dan Berger
• Lauren Berliner
• Johanna Bissat
• Naomi Bragin
• Ching-In Chen
• Raissa DeSmet
• Deborah Hathaway
• Kristine Kellejian
• Kari Lerum
• Lauren Lichty
• Minda Martin
• Jason Morse
• Jed Murr
• Yolanda Padilla
• Alice Pedersen
• Loren Redwood
• Julie Shayne
• Neil Simpkins
• Iris Viveros Avendano

Allied Faculty outside of IAS:

Nursing & Health Studies

• Jody Early
• Meghan Eagen-Tonkko
• Mabel Ezeonwu

Educational Studies

• Natasha Hakimali Merchant

Academic Advisor

• Jason Angeles

Research Librarian

• Penelope Wood

Courses

A. GWSS Core Courses (GWSS:CORE)

• BISGWS 301 Critical Gender and Sexuality Studies (5 credits)
• BISGWS 302 Histories and Movements of Gender and Sexuality (5 credits) or BISGWS 303 Approaches to Feminist Inquiry (5 credits)

GWSS faculty HIGHLY recommend students take both BISGWS 302 & 303. If a student completes both BISGWS 302 and BISGWS 303, 5 credits from these courses can be applied toward the student’s GWSS coursework requirement.

B. GWSS Coursework

GWSS coursework must either focus on gender, women and sexuality studies histories, themes, and experience and/or use theoretical frameworks and methods grounded in gender, women, and sexuality studies approaches.

• BIS 162 Race, Gender, and Sexuality through Film and Television
• BIS 203 Economics of Gender
• BIS 219 The Politics of Sex Education
• BIS 222 Introduction to Human Sexuality (formerly offered under BIS 316)
• BIS 224 Introduction to Feminist Studies
• BIS 227 Rad Women in the Global South
• BIS 307 Environmental Justice
• BIS 310 Women, Culture & Development
• BIS 324 Gender, Human Rights, and Global Cinema
• BIS 387 Women and American Literature
• BIS 431 Issues in Sexual Politics and Cultures
• BIS 433 Gender, Work and Family
• BIS 436 Comparative Family Systems
• BIS 455 Literature and Sexuality
• BIS 471 Women in Art
• BIS 486 Studies in Women and Literature
• BISSTA 331 The Family in U.S. Society
• BISSTS 420 Race, Gender, Science and Medicine

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Elective Courses from other UW Bothell Schools

• B EDUC 461 Educational Implications of Gender Inequality
• B HLTH 223 Feminist Approaches to Women’s Health
• B HTLH 420 Women’s Global Health and Human Rights
• BST 205 Women in STEM

GWSS Special Topics Courses

GWSS coursework includes the following approved topics courses.

• BCORE 107 Discovery Core I
  • Gender Under Construction
  • Revolution & Feminism in the Americas
• BCORE 115 Discovery Core II
  • Doing Gender Justice
• BCORE 117 Discovery Core II
  • Front & Center: Images of Women in Theatre and Film
• BIS 322 Topics in Performance Studies
  • Performing Race and Gender on Film
• BIS 341 Topics in the Study of Culture
  • Race, Gender and Sexuality in Museum Archives
• BIS 351 Topics in American Culture
  • Women in Film
  • Girls on Film
• BIS 464 Topics in Advanced Cinema Studies
  • Queer & Trans Cinema
• BIS 480 International Study Abroad
  • Gender, Culture, and Human Rights in India
• BIS 490 Advanced Seminar
  • The Power of Feminist Writing
  • The History and Politics of HIV/AIDS
  • Memory Work and Cultural Production in Diaspora
  • Gender and the Politics of Numbers
  • Regulating Sexuality-Activism Policy and Everyday Life
  • Gender, Law & Policy
  • Women, Race, and Class
  • Hollywood Cinema, Gender and Sexuality
  • Commercial Sex Work, Sexual Health, and Global Human Rights
  • Theory and Practice of Queer and Trans Media
  • Culture and Resistance in the Americas
  • Sex Work, Human Trafficking, and Social Justice
  • Race, Gender, and Sexuality in Science Fiction
  • Gender Violence, Policing and the Law
  • Participatory Action Research to Address Sexual and Relationship Violence @ UWB
  • Death Rituals

Curriculum

Major = 40 credits
In addition to the 10 credits of core classes, students will complete a minimum of 30 credits in GWSS elective coursework. A minimum of 15 of these credits must be completed at the Upper Division (300-400) Level.

Minor = 25 credits
In addition to the 5 credits of the core class (BISGWS 301) students will take 20 credits in GWSS courses. A minimum of 10 of these credits must be completed at the Upper Division (300-400) Level.

Tips for preparing for graduate school in GWSS and related fields:

• Get involved in the campus GWSS community, including but not limited to attending films, guest speakers, the Gender Equity Club, student government, etc.
• Discuss graduate options with faculty as soon as you start considering graduate school.
• Save your coursework in your portfolio, and begin thinking about the portfolio in relation to your career interests and/or goals.
• Develop good relationships with faculty whose work you admire. These relationships are important for your intellectual development, and beneficial should you require letters of recommendation.
• Inquire about internship and research opportunities with faculty and/or Career Services.

GWSS Minor

IAS also offers a minor in Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies.

GWSS Social Media

Find out about GWSS events and join the conversation on our Facebook page.
Follow us on Instagram (@gwssuwb) and Snapchat (@gwssuwb)!

Questions?

Contact Professor Alka Kurian, faculty coordinator of GWSS at alkak@uw.edu

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