Explores a particular topic of current interest in gender studies, and may be cross-listed with other departments. Topics will vary with each offering of the course. Different iterations of the course may be taken for credit with the instructor's consent.

Topic for Spring 2013: Masculinities
The course will train students in the careful analysis of gendered social structures linked by narrative of “manhood” and “masculinity.” Students will be expected to evaluate the different types of masculinities that exist, both within a single culture and cross-culturally, and be to both identify and predict the transformations that occur to masculinities over time. Such analysis will allow students to develop a nuanced perception of the role that often unspoken or under-analyzed cultural expectations have in the shaping of power relations, and how the reproduction of those power relations are then linked to other structures of power, both within the individual and throughout the society at large. This training will take place through lecture, discussion, and observational activities that will require students to partake in observations and analyses of masculinity in the practices of their daily life as well as the realm of cultural representation.