Introduction to Women’s Studies: Silences, Voices and Experiences

Curriculum guideline

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Course
WSGR 1100
Discontinued
No
Course code
WSGR 1100
Descriptive
Introduction to Women’s Studies: Silences, Voices and Experiences
Department
Women's Studies
Faculty
Language, Literature & Performing Arts
Credits
3.00
Start date
End term
201610
PLAR
Yes
Semester length
15 weeks
Max class size
35
Contact hours
4 hours per week
Method(s) of instruction
Lecture
Learning activities

The course will employ a number of instructional methods to accomplish its objectives, including some or all of the following:

  1. small and large group discussion;
  2. audio-visual materials;
  3. internet exploration;
  4. interviews;
  5. seminar presentations;
  6. instructors’ comments on students’ written work;
  7. lecture (including guest lecture).
Course description
An introduction to the interdisciplinary field of Women’s Studies, beginning with an historical survey of early texts of Western feminist thought, and including a study of the range of forces and experiences that have shaped, limited, and liberated women in their lives. Students will examine the relative absence of women’s voices from traditional arenas of public power, and consider the extent and nature of women’s disenfranchisement; students will also explore the common and diverse ways women have sought to challenge and to redefine their place in Western society.
Course content

Course content will include:

  1. classic works of Western feminist thought;
  2. academic/scholarly studies of historical and contemporary women’s experiences;
  3. literary works (such as novels, journals, life-writings, poetry, drama) relating to historical or contemporary periods.

Course content may also include:

  1. some exploration of contemporary pop culture and its representations of women (as expressed in music videos, advertising, and other media);
  2. required attendance at an off-campus event (literary, political, theatrical, activist, religious).
Learning outcomes

By the end of the course, successful students should be able to:

  1. understand what is meant by the silencing of women;
  2. discuss the effects of the silencing of women (psychological and societal);
  3. discuss the characterization of women and women’s experience in English literature;
  4. discuss from their own perspective the experiences of women with, and the intersection between, class, age, race, sexuality and sexual orientation;
  5. understand a variety of feminist voices in Western society;
  6. appreciate the diversity of women’s voices and women’s experiences;
  7. identify through their written reflection their own voices;
  8. articulate the relevance of course materials to their own lives and experiences.
Means of assessment

Evaluation will be carried out in accordance with Douglas College policy and will include both formative and summative components. Evaluation will be based on some or all of the following:

  1. journal writing;
  2. participation in class discussion;
  3. essays;
  4. research papers;
  5. oral presentations (individual and/or group);
  6. community life research;
  7. essay-type exams.
Textbook materials

A list of required textbooks and materials is provided on the Instructor’s Course Outline, which is available to students at the beginning of each semester.

Sample textbooks:

  • Ibsen, Henrik, The Doll’s House
  • Maracle, Lee, Sundogs
  • Morrison, Toni, The Bluest Eye
  • Putnam, Dana, and Dorothy Kidd, Elaine Dornan and Patty Moore, eds. The Journal Project: Dialogues and Conversations Inside Women’s Studies
  • The Telling It Book Collective, Telling It: Women and Language Across Cultures
  • Woolf, Virginia, Room of One’s Own and Three Guineas

Sample Course-pack readings:

  • Kingston, Maxine Hong, “The Misery of Silence”
  • hooks, bell, “Writing from the Darkness”
  • Olsen, Tillie, “Silences”
  • Ruth, Sheila, “An Introduction to Women’s Studies”
  • Spender, Dale, “Man Made Language”
  • Walker, Alice, “In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens”