Curriculum and Degree Information

PROGRAM REQUIREMENTS

• 30 credits, including 4 CORE COURSES and 5 elective courses selected from any related courses taught at the Graduate Center.
• Completion of either a research-based thesis of 30-50 pages, OR an internship (non-government organization, policy center, United Nations agency, and the like), with a final written report.

Someone attending full-time could complete the degree in 1.5 years. Part-time students will have up to 4 years to complete the degree.

Core Courses

Feminist Texts and Theories

This course provides a broad overview of the issues and critical texts of feminist theory. The instructor will use an interdisciplinary approach to consider some of the major questions, methodologies, and findings of Women’s Studies Scholarship. The course will cover a selection of theoretical texts from multiple disciplines, both classic and contemporary. In addition, students will explore the ways in which the field of women’s studies has raised new questions and brought new perspectives to those areas where the humanities and social and behavioral sciences intersect, with material which is interdisciplinary in nature and frequently poses a challenge to conventional disciplinary boundaries.

Global Feminisms

This course explores the gender dynamics of racial, ethnic, and economic relations of power in domestic, international, and transnational settings. It examines feminist scholarship produced by and about American women of color, Third World women, and other social and political actors whose experiences and thinking have shaped contemporary ideas about gender, power, and international political economies. As many cultures eschew the term “feminist,” the course explores how both self-identified feminists and people who do not consider themselves feminists write about and understand gender, justice, human rights, tolerance, agency, imperialism, and other relevant topics. We will also examine how women and self-identified feminists practice solidarity across and within national boundaries, paying attention to the possibilities and constraints that shape transnational feminist activism.

Topics in Women’s and Gender Studies

This course will vary from semester to semester, depending on the given instructor’s interests. Previous course offerings include “Feminism, Autobiography, Theory: Women Writing Witness,” Professor Nancy K. Miller; “Trans Theories, Practices, Politics,” Professor Paisley Currah; “Poststructuralism, Postmodernism, Posthumanism,” Professor Domna Stanton; “New Feminist Epistemologies and Metaphysics,” Professor Linda Martín Alcoff; and “Motherhood: Body and Citizenship,” Professor Barbara Katz Rothman.

Research Seminar in Methodology

This course will provide an overview of current women’s and gender scholarship and will introduce students to a range of feminist research methods in the humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences. Examples will be drawn from scholarship in a broad range of geographical and historical sites.