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{{short description|Academic field that places women's lives and experiences at the center of study}}
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{{redirect|Feminist studies|the journal|Feminist Studies{{!}}''Feminist Studies''}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2022}}
{{Feminism sidebar|theory}}
'''Women's studies''' is an academic field that draws on ] and interdisciplinary methods to place women's lives and experiences at the center of study, while examining ] of ]; systems of privilege and oppression; and the relationships between power and gender as they intersect with other identities and social locations such as ], ], ], and ].<ref>{{Cite book|title=Women's voices, feminist visions: classic and contemporary readings|last1=Shaw|first1=Susan M. |last2=Lee|first2=Janet|isbn=978-0078027000|edition=Sixth|publisher=McGraw-Hill|location=New York, NY|oclc=862041473|date=23 April 2014}}</ref>


Popular concepts that are related to the field of women's studies include ], ], intersectionality, ], ], ], ] studies, ], ], ], and embodiment.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Oxford Handbook of Feminist Theory|year=2018|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0190872823|oclc=1002116432}}</ref> Research practices and methodologies associated with women's studies include ], ], ]s, surveys, community-based research, discourse analysis, and reading practices associated with ], ], and ].<ref name=":02">{{Cite book|title=Feminist research practice: a primer|last=Hesse-Biber|first=Sharlene Nagy|isbn=9781412994972|edition=Second|publisher=SAGE Publications|location=Thousand Oaks, CA|oclc=838201827|date=18 July 2013}}</ref> The field researches and critiques different societal norms of ], ], class, ], and other ].
'''Women's studies''' is an ] ] devoted to topics concerning ], ], ], and ]. It often includes ], ] (eg history of ]) and ], ], ], and the ] and ]-influenced practice of most of the ] and ].


Women's studies is related to the fields of ], feminist studies, and sexuality studies, and more broadly related to the fields of ], ], and ].<ref>{{Cite book|title=Women's studies on its own: a next wave reader in institutional change|date=2002|publisher=Duke University Press|last=Wiegman|first=Robyn|isbn=9780822329862|location=Durham|oclc=49421587|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780822329862}}</ref>
==History==
"Women's studies" was first conceived as an academic ] apart from other departments in the late 1960s, as the ] of ] gained political influence in the academy through student and faculty ]. As an academic discipline, it was modeled on the ] and ethnic studies (such as ]) and Chicano Studies programs that had arisen shortly before it. The first Women's Studies Program in the United States was established on ], ] at ] after a year of intense organizing (women's ]s, rallies, petition circulating, and operating unofficial or experimental classes and presentations before seven committees and assemblies) (). ] was the student co-founder along with Dr. Joyce Nower, a literature instructor. In the 1970s many universities and colleges created departments and programs in women's studies, and professorships became available in the field which did not require the sponsorship of other departments.


Women's studies courses are now offered in over seven hundred institutions in the United States, and globally in more than forty countries.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Transforming Scholarship: Why Women's and Gender Studies Students Are Changing Themselves and the World|last1=Berger|first1=Michele Tracy|last2=Radeloff|first2=Cheryl|publisher=Routledge|year=2015|isbn=978-0-415-83653-1|location=New York|page=7}}</ref>
==Current courses in women's studies==


== History ==
Women's studies courses are available at many universities and colleges around the world. In 2006, the Artemis Guide to Women's Studies<ref></ref> provides a listing of 395 programs in the ], but may be out of date. Courses in the ] can be found through the ]<ref></ref>.
===Africa===
The erasure of women and their activities in Africa was complex. When women's studies emerged in the 1980s, it focused on recovering women from the obscurity of all of African history caused by ] and the "patriarchal social systems" left behind in Africa after decolonization.<ref name="Yacob Falola 2021">{{cite book |last1=Yacob-Haliso |first1=Olajumoke |last2=Falola |first2=Toyin |editor1-last=Yacob-Haliso |editor1-first=Olajumoke |editor2-last=Falola |editor2-first=Toyin |title=The Palgrave Handbook of African Women's Studies |doi=10.1007/978-3-030-28099-4 |date=2021 |publisher=] |location=Cham, Switzerland |chapter=] |pages=3–43 |isbn=978-3-030-28099-4}}</ref>{{rp|12}} Because systems prevailed which supported boys' education over that of girls, in the era following independence there were few women who could read and write. Those who could were not encouraged to become professionals and often resorted to activism to address educational and other disadvantages women faced in the 1960s and 1970s. The first generation of scholars focused on establishing and legitimizing Africa's precolonial history.<ref name="Yacob Falola 2021" />{{rp|13}} They also questioned whether the Western construct of gender applied in Africa or whether the concepts of gender existed in pre-colonial Africa.<ref name="Yacob Falola 2021" />{{rp|14–15}}


]'s work ''Male Daughters, Female Husbands'' (1987) and ]'s ''The Invention of Women'' (1997) are some of the first works which sought to examine gender perceptions in Africa.<ref name="Yacob Falola 2021" />{{rp|14}} In 1977, the ] (AAWORD) was established to promote research on African women by African women. Scholars affiliated with the organization from its founding included: ] (Nigeria), ] (Ivory Coast), (] (Nigeria), ] (Egypt), ] (Nigeria), ] (Nigeria), ] (Kenya), ] (Sierra Leone), ] (Senegal), and ] (Ethiopia).<ref name="Yacob Falola 2021" />{{rp|15}} Other scholars joined ] (DAWN), a network for feminist academics and activists focused on the ], created in 1984.<ref name="Yacob Falola 2021" />{{rp|15}}<ref name="Baksh-SoodeenHarcourt2015">{{cite book|last1=Atrobus|first1=Peggy|authorlink1=Peggy Antrobus|author2=Wendy Harcourt|editor=Rawwida Baksh-Soodeen|title=The Oxford Handbook of Transnational Feminist Movements|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SupcBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA159|year=2015|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-994349-4|pages=159–187|chapter=DAWN, the Third World Feminist Network: Upturning Hierarchies}}</ref> African scholars among DAWN's founding members were ] (Morocco), Pala Okeyo (Kenya), and ] (Senegal).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sen |first1=Gita |last2=Grown |first2=Caren |title=Development, Crises, and Alternative Visions: Third World Women's Perspectives |url=https://dawnnet.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/devt_crisesalt_visions_sen_and_grown.pdf |date=1987 |publisher=] |location=New York, New York |isbn=978-0-85345-718-3}}</ref>{{rp|front fly}} These scholars inspired a second group of researchers and activists, which included: ] (Zimbabwe), ] (Nigeria), ] (Eswatini), ] (Nigeria), ] (Ghana), ] (Kenya), and ] (Nigeria).<ref name="Yacob Falola 2021" />{{rp|15}} The ] established the Development and Women's Studies Program (DAWS) in 1989, which by 1996 offered both undergraduate and graduate level studies.<ref name="Prah 1996">{{cite journal |last1=Prah |first1=Mansah |title=Women's Studies in Ghana |journal=] |date=Spring–Summer 1996 |volume=24 |issue=1–2 |pages=412–422 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40004542 |access-date=28 April 2023 |publisher=Feminist Press |location=New York, New York |jstor=40004542 |issn=0732-1562 |oclc=5547276845}}</ref>{{rp|415}} After the demise of ], the ], South Africa established the ] in 1996 to facilitate research and gender studies in Africa. By 2003, full departments dedicated to gender and women's studies had also been established at ] (Uganda), the ] (Cameroon), and the ] (Zambia).<ref name="Manuh 2007">{{cite book |last1=Manuh |first1=Takyiwaa |editor1-last=Cole |editor1-first=Catherine M. |editor2-last=Manuh |editor2-first=Takyiwaa |editor3-last=Miescher |editor3-first=Stephan |title=Africa after Gender?|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IYcOgxeVTrMC&pg=PA128 |date=2007 |publisher=] |location=Bloomington, Indiana |chapter=7. Doing Gender Work in Ghana |pages=125–149 |isbn=978-0-253-21877-3}}</ref>{{rp|128}}
==Criticisms of women's studies as a discipline==


=== Americas ===
Lerhman criticizes the state of women's studies as summarized below. She quotes Patai and Koertge who say that the feminism expoused in the vast majority of women's studies departments "bids to be a totalizing scheme resting on a grand theory, one that is as all-inclusive as Marxism, as assured of it's ability to unmask hidden meanings as Freudian psychology, and as fervent in its condemnation of apostates as evangelical fundamentalism..."
The first accredited women's studies course in the U.S. was held in 1969 at ].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eDF5Ic-DL1wC&pg=PA388|title=The Encyclopedia of Stress and Stress-related Diseases|last=Kahn|first=Ada P.|publisher=Facts on File|year=2006|isbn=978-0816059379|edition=2nd|page=388|access-date=29 September 2012}}</ref> After a year of intense organizing of women's ]s, rallies, petition circulating, and operating unofficial or experimental classes and presentations before seven committees and assemblies, the first women's studies program in the United States was established in 1970 at San Diego State College (now ]).<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Salper|first=Roberta|date=November 2011|title=San Diego State 1970: The Initial Year of the Nation's First Women's Studies Program|url=http://www.feministstudies.org/issues/vol-30-39/37-3.html|journal=]|volume=37|issue=3|pages=658–682|doi=10.1353/fem.2011.0055 |s2cid=147077577 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/dept/wsweb/|title=SDSU Women's Studies Department|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140918042623/http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/dept/wsweb/|archive-date=18 September 2014|url-status=dead|access-date=6 October 2014}}</ref> In conjunction with ], students and community members created the ad hoc committee for women's studies.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://womensstudies.sdsu.edu/history.htm|title=History:: Department of Women's Studies at San Diego State University|website=womensstudies.sdsu.edu|access-date=9 December 2015}}</ref> The second women's studies program in the United States was established in 1971 at Wichita State University in Wichita, Kansas. It was mostly formed through many efforts by women in the English department, administration and within the community.<ref>Chinyere Okafor citing from The Center for Women's Studies' papers at WSU</ref> By 1974, San Diego State University faculty members began a nationwide campaign for the integration of the department. At the time, these actions and the field were extremely political.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Boxer|first=Marilyn J.|date=Fall 2002|title=Women's studies as women's history|journal=Women's Studies Quarterly |volume=30|issue=3–4|pages=42–51|jstor=40003241}}</ref> Before formalized departments and programs, many women's studies courses were advertised unofficially around campuses and taught by women faculty members – without pay – in addition to their established teaching and administrative responsibilities.<ref>{{Cite book|chapter=Triumphs, Controversies, and Change: 1970s to the Twenty-First Century|title=The Evolution of American Women's Studies: Reflections on Triumphs, Controversies, and Change|last=Ginsberg|first=Alice E.|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|year=2008|isbn=978-0-230-60579-4|location=New York|page=|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/evolutionofameri0000unse/page/11}}</ref> Then, as in many cases today, faculty who teach in women's studies often hold faculty appointments in other departments on campus.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Transforming Scholarship: Why Women's and Gender Studies Students Are Changing Themselves and the World|last1=Berger|first1=Michele Tracy|last2=Radeloff|first2=Cheryl|publisher=Routledge|year=2015|isbn=978-0-415-83653-1|location=New York|page=49}}</ref>
Lerhman goes on to say that feminist writers "by squelching all internal dissent" have "allowed hyperbolic rhetoric, false statistics, politicized scholarship, reverse sexism, and general silliness free reign".


The first scholarly journal in interdisciplinary women's studies, '']'', began publishing in 1972.<ref name="FSAboutUs2">{{cite web|url=http://www.feministstudies.org/aboutfs/history.html|title=History|publisher=Feminist Studies|access-date=30 May 2014}}</ref> The ] (of the United States) was established in 1977.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nwsa.org/content.asp?pl=19&contentid=19|title=NWSA|website=nwsa.org|access-date=26 July 2015}}</ref>
*Orthodoxy and ideological policing
*Ostracization and/or termination of female dissidents
*Exclusion of male authors from course syllabi and scholarly papers
*Politicized scholarship and "thinly disguised indoctrination"
*Faculty appointments based on political rather than professional qualifications
*Questionable methodologies, statistics, and conclusions
*Advocacy diguised as research
*"Womb-like" classroom atmospheres where expressing unpopular opinions or asking unpopular questions is suppressed and where critical thinking is discouraged
*"Unremitting emphasis on women as oppressed victims"


In 1977, there were 276 women's studies programs nationwide in the United States. The number of programs increased in the following decade, growing up to 530 programs in 1989,<ref>{{Cite journal|date=December 2007|title=A National Census of Women's Studies Programs|url=https://www.nwsa.org/Files/Resources/NWSA_CensusonWSProgs.pdf|journal=NORC Project|pages=25}}</ref> which included the program at the ] founded by ] in 1986.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Rodríguez |first1=Jorge |title=El feminism llevado a la práctica |url=https://gpa.eastview.com/crl/elmundo/?a=d&d=mndo19900903-01.1.32&srpos=5&e=-------en-25-mndo-1--img-txIN-%22Margarita+Beni%cc%81tez%22--------- |access-date=17 April 2023 |work=] |date=3 September 1990 |location=San Juan, Puerto Rico |page=32 |language=Spanish |trans-title=Feminism Put into Practice}}</ref> Around the 1980s, universities in the U.S. saw the growth and development of women's studies courses and programs across the country while the field continued to grapple with backlash from both conservative groups and concerns from those within the ] about the white, ], and ] of those in the academy.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/evolutionofameri0000unse/page/16|title=The evolution of American women's studies: reflections on triumphs, controversies, and change|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|year=2008|isbn=9780230605794|editor-last=Ginsberg|editor-first=Alice E.|edition=1st|location=New York|page=|oclc=224444238}}</ref>
==Further reading==
*''Professing Feminism: Cautionary Tales from the Strange World of Women's Studies''; Daphne Patai and Noretta Koertge, 1995, ISBN 0465098274
*''The Lipstick Proviso: Women, Sex & Power in the Real World''; Karen Lehrman, 1997, ISBN 0385474814
*Florence Howe (ed), Mari Jo Buhle (introduction), ''The Politics of Women's Studies: Testimony from Thirty Founding Mothers'', Paperback edition, New York: Feminist Press 2001
*Gabriele Griffin and Rosi Braidotti (eds.), ''Thinking differently : a reader in European women's studies'', London etc. : Zed Books, 2002
*Ellen Messer-Davidow: ''Disciplining feminism : from social activism to academic discourse'', Durham, NC etc. : Duke University Press, 2002


In Canada The first few university courses in Women's Studies were taught in the early 1970s. In 1984 the federal government established five regional endowed chairs in Women's Studies for each region of the country at:
==See also==
* Simon Fraser University (British Columbia),
*]
* University of Winnipeg and University of Manitoba (Prairies, joint chair)
*]
* Carleton University and the University of Ottawa (Ontario, joint chair),
*]
* Université Laval (Quebec), and
*]
* Mount St Vincent University (Atlantic Canada).<ref>
*]
{{cite encyclopedia |last = Eichler |first = Margrit
*]
|title= Women's Studies
*]
|encyclopedia= The Canadian Encyclopedia
*]
|url= https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/womens-studies |access-date= 18 November 2002}}</ref>
*]

Around the same time, women academics in Latin America began to form women's studies groups.<ref name="Arango" />{{Rp|17}}<ref name=Cienciágora /><ref name="Lozano Rubello">{{cite journal |last1=Lozano Rubello |first1=Gabriela |title=Los estudios de género en la UBA y la UNAM: una conquista del feminismo académico |journal=Universidades |date=October 2019 |volume=70 |issue=81 |pages=45–54 |url=https://www.redalyc.org/journal/373/37361142006/html/ |access-date=23 April 2022 |trans-title=Gender Studies at the UBA and UNAM: A Conquest of Academic Feminism |publisher=Unión de Universidades de América Latina |location=Mexico City, Mexico |doi=10.36888/udual.universidades.2019.81.36 |s2cid=213247078 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220325215530/https://www.redalyc.org/journal/373/37361142006/html/ |archive-date=25 March 2022 |language=Spanish |issn=0041-8935 |oclc=8405154533|doi-access=free |hdl=11336/135221 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> The first chair of women's studies in Mexico was created in the political and social sciences faculty of the ] in 1970. Starting in 1979, the Grupo Autónomo de Mujeres Universitarias (GAMU, Autonomous Group of University Women), which included both Mexican faculty and students began meeting periodically to discuss how feminism could be introduced to various campuses across the country. In 1982, a women's studies program was created at the ].<ref name="Lozano Rubello" /> Similarly in 1983, activists in the Mexican feminist movement, including ], ], and ], founded the Programa Interdisciplinario de Estudios de la Mujer (PIEG, Interdisciplinary Women's Studies Program) at ] in Mexico City.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Poy Solano |first1=Laura |title=Reconoce el Colmex a tres pioneras de los estudios de género |url=https://www.jornada.com.mx/notas/2021/03/11/politica/reconoce-el-colmex-a-tres-pioneras-de-los-estudios-de-genero/ |access-date=11 April 2022 |work=] |date=11 March 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210311205652/https://www.jornada.com.mx/notas/2021/03/11/politica/reconoce-el-colmex-a-tres-pioneras-de-los-estudios-de-genero/ |archive-date=11 March 2021 |location=Mexico City, Mexico |language=Spanish |trans-title=Colmex Recognizes Three Pioneers of Gender Studies |url-status=live}}</ref> In 1984, academics formed the Centro de Estudios de la Mujer (Center for Women's Studies) in the psychology faculty at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. The field was formalized with the creation of the Programa Universitario de Estudios de Género (PUEG, University Program on Gender Studies) in 1992, at the urging of academics like ], ], {{ill|Graciela Hierro|es}}, ], ], and ].<ref name="Lozano Rubello" />

Activists and researchers in Chile began meeting in 1978 with creation of the Círculo de la Mujer (Women's Circle). In 1984, they founded the Centro de Estudios de la Mujer (CEM, Center for Women's Studies) in ] to facilitate multi-disciplinary studies on women and gender.<ref>{{cite web |title=Fuimos pioneras en investigación de género en Chile |url=https://cem.cl/nosotras/ |website=Centro de Estudios de la Mujer |date=18 January 2021 |access-date=25 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220425181739/https://cem.cl/nosotras/ |archive-date=25 April 2022 |location=Santiago, Chile |language=Spanish |trans-title=We Were the Pioneers of Gender Research in Chile |url-status=live}}</ref> That same year, ] began teaching women's studies in Peru,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Henríquez |first1=Narda |title=Gender Studies in Peru |journal=] |date=Spring–Summer 1996 |volume=XXIV |issue=1–2 |url=https://archive.org/details/beijingbeyondtow0000unse/page/371/mode/1up |access-date=22 April 2023 |publisher=] |location=New York, New York |page=371 |issn=0732-1562 |oclc=5547267445}}</ref> and the following year, she along with ] and others, founded the ].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Arenas |first1=Catalina |title=Virginia Guzmán del CEM: "Una Constitución con mujeres va a entender de otra manera la igualdad» |url=https://oge.cl/entrevista-a-virginia-guzman-una-constitucion-con-mujeres/ |website=Observatorio de Género y Equidad |publisher=] |access-date=22 April 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200812050224/https://oge.cl/entrevista-a-virginia-guzman-una-constitucion-con-mujeres/ |archive-date=12 August 2020 |location=Santiago, Chile |language=Spanish |trans-title=Virginia Guzmán from CEM: 'A Constitution with Women Will Understand Equality in a Different Way' |date=16 December 2019 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=Trevizan>{{cite book |last=Trevizan |first=Liliana |editor1-last=Tompkins |editor1-first=Cynthia |editor2-last=Foster |editor2-first=David William |title=Notable Twentieth-Century Latin American Women: A Biographical Dictionary |year=2001 |publisher=] |location=Westport, Connecticut |chapter=Virginia Vargas |pages=287–291 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=a7TY2ElIcrUC&pg=PA287 |isbn=978-0-313-31112-3}}</ref>{{rp|288}} The center provided a research facility for women scholars and provided publishing for their works.<ref name=Trevizan />{{rp|289}} From the early 1980s, women like ], ], ], ], ], ], {{ill|Yolanda Puyana Villamizar|wikidata|Q93430228}}, ] and ] worked to create an interdisciplinary field of feminist study in ].<ref name="Arango" >{{cite book |last1=Arango Gaviria |first1=Luz Gabriela |editor1-last=Gil Hernández |editor1-first=Franklin |editor2-last=Pérez-Bustos |editor2-first=Tania |title=Feminismos y estudios de género en Colombia: un campo académico y político en movimiento |url=http://www.codajic.org/sites/default/files/sites/www.codajic.org/files/Feminismo%20y%20Estudios%20de%20G%C3%A9nero%20en%20Colombia.pdf |date=2018 |edition=Primeraición |publisher=] Press |location=Bogotá, Colombia |language=Spanish |trans-title=Feminisms and Gender Studies in Colombia: An Academic Field and Political Movement |chapter=Un proyecto académico feminista en mutación: la Escuela de Estudios de Género de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia |pages=17–38 |isbn=978-958-783-334-8}}</ref>{{rp|17}} First they met informally, then were able to gain official recognition in 1985 as the Grupo de Estudios Mujer y Sociedad (Women & Society Study Group) and finally in 1994,<ref name=Cienciágora >{{cite web |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |title=Florence Thomas |url=https://cienciagora.universia.net.co/infodetail/ciencias-sociales-afines/galeria_de_cientificos/florence-thomas-336.html |website=Cienciágora |publisher=] |access-date=22 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220422200008/https://cienciagora.universia.net.co/infodetail/ciencias-sociales-afines/galeria_de_cientificos/florence-thomas-336.html |archive-date=22 April 2022 |location=Bogotá, Colombia |language=Spanish |date=7 March 2008 |url-status=live}}</ref> they launched the Programa de Estudios de Género, Mujer y Desarrollo (PGMD, Gender, Women and Development Studies Program) in the Human Sciences Department at the ].<ref name="Arango" />{{Rp|17}}

In 1985, activists in ] launched the "Introduction to Women's Studies" and a post-graduate seminar, "La construcción social del género sexual" (The Social Construction of Sexual Gender) at the ]. In 1987, ] became the chair of UBA's degree program in women's studies. In 1992, the Area Interdisciplinaria de Estudios de la Mujer (AIEM, Interdisciplinary Area of Women's Studies), which became the Instituto Interdisciplinario de Estudios de Género (Interdisciplinary Institute of Gender Studies) in 1997, was founded at UBA linking academics from the faculties of Arts, Anthropology, Classics and Letters, Education, History, Languages, and Philosophy to encourage broader research and analysis of women in these fields.<ref name="Lozano Rubello" /> ] founded the {{lang|es|Centro de Estudios Históricos sobre las Mujeres|italics=no}} (Center for Historical Studies on Women), which began in 1993 to offer the first master's degree in women's studies in Latin America.<ref>{{cite news |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |title=Murió Hilda Habichayn, reconocida docente de la UNR y activista por la igualdad de género |url=https://www.lacapital.com.ar/la-ciudad/murio-hilda-habichayn-reconocida-docente-la-unr-y-activista-la-igualdad-genero-n2660403.html |access-date=6 April 2023 |work=] |date=12 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210613033144/https://www.lacapital.com.ar/la-ciudad/murio-hilda-habichayn-reconocida-docente-la-unr-y-activista-la-igualdad-genero-n2660403.html |archive-date=13 June 2021 |location=Rosario, Argentina |language=Spanish |trans-title=Hilda Habichayn, Renowned UNR Teacher and Gender Equality Activist, Died |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Arrabal |first1=Victoria |title=Académicas con la lupa en el género |url=https://www.pagina12.com.ar/179655-academicas-con-la-lupa-en-el-genero |access-date=6 April 2023 |work=] |date=9 March 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330052741/https://www.pagina12.com.ar/179655-academicas-con-la-lupa-en-el-genero |archive-date=30 March 2019 |location=Buenos Aires, Argentina |language=Spanish |trans-title=Academics with a Magnifying Glass on Gender |url-status=live}}</ref>

The first women's study program in ] was the {{lang|es|Centro Paraguayo de estudios de la Mujer}} (Paraguayan Center of Women's Studies) at the ]. It was founded in 1983 by ], ], ] and ].<ref>{{cite web |last1=González de Bosio |first1=Beatriz |title=Dia de la mujer paraguaya 24 de ferbrero |url=http://corredordelasideas.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Mujer-Paraguaya-Ampliado.pdf |website=Corredor de las Ideas |publisher=Corridor of Ideas of the Southern Cone-X International Colloquium of Political Philosophy |access-date=25 April 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230425174507/http://corredordelasideas.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Mujer-Paraguaya-Ampliado.pdf |archive-date=25 April 2023 |location=San Leopoldo, Brazil |language=Spanish |trans-title=Paraguayan Women's Day 24 February |date=March 2020 |page=6 |url-status=live}}</ref> The {{lang|es|Grupo de Estudios de la Mujer Paraguaya|italics=no}} (GEMPA, Paraguayan Women's Studies Group) was founded at the Paraguayan Center for Sociological Studies in 1985 by ] and ].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Santa Cruz Cosp |first1=María Clara |title=Estudios de Género y Ciencias Sociales en Paraguay |url=http://biblioteca.clacso.edu.ar/gsdl/collect/clacso/index/assoc/D9172.dir/SantaCruzArticuloFinal.pdf |date=2013 |publisher=Biblioteca Clacso |location=Buenos Aires, Argentina |language=Spanish |trans-title=Gender Studies and Social Sciences in Paraguay |page=11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220126011931/http://biblioteca.clacso.edu.ar/gsdl/collect/clacso/index/assoc/D9172.dir/SantaCruzArticuloFinal.pdf |archive-date=26 January 2022 |url-status=live}}</ref>
Gender studies also began to be established in universities in Brazil in the 1980s and continued expanding throughout the 1990s.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Peluffo |first1=Pelufo |last2=Josiowicz |first2=Alejandra |title=Simpósio: cinco questões sobre os estudos de gênero na América Latina |journal=Estudos Históricos |date=May–August 2020 |volume=33 |issue=70 |pages=227–253 |doi=10.1590/S2178-14942020000200002 |url=https://www.scielo.br/j/eh/a/CtjSvpNF73XHBz3HXpCkTyC/?format=pdf&lang=pt |access-date=25 April 2022 |trans-title=Symposium: Five Questions about Gender Studies in Latin America |publisher=Centro de Pesquisa e Documentação da História Contemporânea do Brasil |location=Rio de Janeiro |s2cid=225891059 |language=Portuguese |issn=0103-2186 |oclc=8605481991|doi-access=free }}</ref> In 1992, Brazilian academics at the ] launched '']'', one of the primary academic journals on gender in Brazil.
<ref>{{cite web |title=Revista Estudos Feministas |url=https://www.scielo.br/journal/ref/about/ |website=] |publisher=] |access-date=10 April 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230316142714/https://www.scielo.br/journal/ref/about/ |archive-date=16 March 2023 |location=São Paulo, Brazil |date=31 January 2022 |url-status=live}}</ref> Among the contributors for the inaugural issue were {{ill|Ana Arruda Callado|pt}}, ], ], {{ill|Mary Garcia Castro|pt}}, ], ], ], ], ], ], and others.<ref>*{{cite journal |editor1-last=Lavinas |editor1-first=Lena |editor2-last=Lamego |editor2-first=Valéria |title=Colaboradores |journal=Revista Estudos Feministas |date=1992 |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=242–243 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/43903491 |access-date=9 April 2023 |trans-title=Collaborators |publisher=Interdisciplinar de Estudos Contemporâneos da Escola de Comunicação da Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro |location=Rio de Janeiro, Brazil |jstor=43903491 |language=Portuguese |issn=0104-026X |oclc=6864701369}}</ref>

The political aims of the ] that compelled the formation of women's studies found itself at odds with the institutionalized ] of the 1990s.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Wiegman|first=Robyn|title=Women's Studies on the Edge|publisher=Duke University Press|year=2008|isbn=978-0-8223-4274-8|editor-last=Scott|editor-first=Joan Wallach|location=Durham|page=41|chapter=Feminism, Institutionalism, and the Idiom of Failure}}</ref> As "woman" as a concept continued to be expanded, the exploration of social constructions of gender led to the field's expansion into both gender studies and sexuality studies. The field of women's studies continued to grow during the 1990s and into the 2000s with the expansion of universities offering majors, minors, and certificates in women's studies, gender studies, and feminist studies. The first official PhD program in Women's Studies was established at ] in 1990.<ref>{{cite web|title=Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies|url=http://www.gs.emory.edu/academics/program_pages/gender.html|access-date=6 October 2014}}</ref> {{As of|2012|post=,}} there were 16 institutions offering a PhD in Women's Studies in the United States.<ref>{{cite web|title=NWSA|url=http://nwsa.org/AF_institution_Directory.asp|access-date=26 July 2015|website=nwsa.org}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Artemis Guide to Women's Studies in the U.S|url=http://www.artemisguide.com/|access-date=6 October 2014}}</ref> Since then, UC Santa Cruz (2013),<ref>{{Cite web|title=UC Santa Cruz – Feminist Studies|url=http://feministstudies.ucsc.edu/|access-date=22 August 2016|website=feministstudies.ucsc.edu}}</ref> the University of Kentucky-Lexington (2013),<ref>{{Cite web|title=PHD Program {{!}} Gender & Women's Studies|url=https://gws.as.uky.edu/phd-program-gws|access-date=22 August 2016|website=gws.as.uky.edu}}</ref> Stony Brook University (2014),<ref>{{Cite web|title=Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies|url=http://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/wgss/|access-date=22 August 2016|website=stonybrook.edu}}</ref> and Oregon State University (2016)<ref>{{Cite web|date=21 September 2015|title=PhD in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies! {{!}} College of Liberal Arts {{!}} Oregon State University|url=http://liberalarts.oregonstate.edu/school-language-culture-and-society/wgss/phd-women-gender-and-sexuality-studies|access-date=22 August 2016|website=liberalarts.oregonstate.edu}}</ref> also introduced a PhD in the field.

=== Australia ===
In 1956, Australian feminist ] took up a lectureship in the Department of Adult Education at ] and began researching and teaching on the status of women. Dawson's course, "Women in a Changing World", which focused on the socio-economic and political status of women in western Europe, becoming one of the first women's studies courses.<ref>{{Cite web | url=http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/07/30/1059480406739.html | title=Ardent warrior for women's rights| date=31 July 2003}}</ref>

===Asia===
==== Central Asia ====
In 2015 at ], the first master's degree course in gender and women's studies in Afghanistan began.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://blogs.reuters.com/faithworld/2015/10/26/kabul-university-unlikely-host-for-first-afghan-womens-studies-programme/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151027133909/http://blogs.reuters.com/faithworld/2015/10/26/kabul-university-unlikely-host-for-first-afghan-womens-studies-programme/|url-status=dead|archive-date=27 October 2015|title=Kabul University unlikely host for first Afghan women's studies programme|author=FaithWorld|date=26 October 2015|work=Reuters.com|access-date=2 November 2015}}</ref>

=== Europe ===
Elizabeth Bird traced the development of Women's Studies in the UK out of informal education run by the ] (WLM), the Workers' Educational Association, "CR" or "]" groups, left-wing activist groups, and extramural departments attached to universities and colleges.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last=Bird|first=Elizabeth|date=1 June 2003|title=Women's studies and the women's movement in Britain: origins and evolution, 1970–2000|journal=Women's History Review|language=en|volume=12|issue=2|pages=263–288|doi=10.1080/09612020300200351|s2cid=144545954 |issn=0961-2025|doi-access=free}}</ref> Bird notes that, according to feminist activists and scholars Anna Coote and Beatrix Campbell who interviewed many participants in the 1960s-70s development of women's studies, "in the summer of 1969 Juliet Mitchell taught a short course entitled 'The Role of Women in Society' in the 'Anti University', which had been organised by radical academics as part of the student protest movement".<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite book|last1=Coote|first1=Anna|title=Sweet Freedom: the struggle for women's liberation|last2=Campbell|first2=Beatrix|publisher=Pan Macmillan|year=1982|location=London}}</ref> Maggie Humm identifies this summer course as "Britain's first women's studies course".<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite book|last=Humm|first=Maggie|title=Feminisms: a reader|publisher=Harvester Wheatsheaf|location=Hemel Hempstead|pages=xvi}}</ref>

In 1975, Margarita Rendel, Oonagh Hartnett, Zoe Fairbairns, wrote a guide outlining the 17 then-existing undergraduate courses, 1 postgraduate option, four college of education offers and six polytechnics courses in Women's Studies – often called 'women in society' – in the United Kingdom.<ref>{{Cite book|last1=Hartnett|first1=Oonagh|title=Women's Studies Courses in the United Kingdom|last2=Rendel|first2=Margarita|last3=Fairbairns|first3=Zoe|publisher=Margarita Rendel|year=1975|location=London}}</ref> They compiled the guide from surveys of UK universities and adding to research previously published by Sue Beardon and Erika Stevenson for the ] in 1974.<ref name=":0" />

A part time postgraduate Diploma in Women's Studies was offered by The Polytechnic of Central London from 1977, and in 1978 an MA course on the subject of 'Rights', including women's rights, was organised by Margarita Rendel at the London Institute of Education.

In 1980, the University of Kent launched the first named MA degree in Women's Studies, with Mary Evans leading the development of the course.<ref name=":0" /> Following Kent, Bradford (1982), Sheffield City Polytechnic (1983), Warwick (1983) and York (1984) opened MA courses.<ref name=":0" /> In 1990, part-time BAs in Women's Studies launched at the Polytechnic of North East London and at Preston Polytechnic.<ref name=":0" /> ] was recruited by the ] in 1983 to initiate a women's studies course there.<ref name=":04">{{Cite web|last=Taylor|first=Barbara|date=31 January 2021|title=Veronica Beechey obituary|url=http://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/31/veronica-beechey-obituary|access-date=27 January 2022|website=The Guardian|language=en}}</ref>

Current courses in Women's Studies in the United Kingdom can be found through the ].<ref>{{cite web|title=Universities and Colleges Admissions Service, United Kingdom|url=http://www.ucas.com|access-date=6 October 2014|website=UCAS}}</ref>

== Theoretical traditions and research methods ==
]]]
Early women's studies courses and curricula were often driven by the question "Why are women not included? Where are the women?".<ref>{{Cite book|chapter=Women's Studies – The Early Years: When Sisterhood Was Powerful|last=Rothenberg|first=Paula|title=The Evolution of American Women's Studies|publisher=Palgrave MacMillan|year=2008|isbn=978-0-230-60579-4|editor-last=Ginsberg|editor-first=Alice E.|location=New York|page=|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/evolutionofameri0000unse/page/68}}</ref> That is, as more women became more present in higher education as both students and faculty, questions arose about the male-centric nature of most courses and curricula. Women faculty in traditional departments such as history, English, and philosophy began to offer courses with a focus on women. Drawing from the women's movement's notion that "the personal is political", courses also began to develop around sexual politics, women's roles in society, and the ways in which women's personal lives reflect larger power structures.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The evolution of American women's studies: reflections on triumphs, controversies, and change|editor-last=Ginsberg|editor-first=Alice E.|year=2008|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=9780230605794|edition=1st|location=New York|page=|oclc=224444238|url=https://archive.org/details/evolutionofameri0000unse/page/69}}</ref>

Since the 1970s, scholars of women's studies have taken ] approaches to understand gender and its intersections with race, class, ethnicity, sexuality, religion, age, and (dis)ability to produce and maintain power structures within society. With this turn, there has been a focus on language, subjectivity, and social hegemony, and how the lives of subjects, however they identify, are constituted. At the core of these theories is the notion that however one identifies, gender, sex, and sexuality are not intrinsic, but are socially constructed.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.nwsa.org/Files/Resources/WS_Integrative_Learning_Levine.pdf|title=Questions for A New Century: Women's Studies and Integrative Learning|last=Levin|first=Amy K.|year=2007|website=nwsa.org|access-date=18 November 2017}}</ref>

Major theories employed in women's studies courses include ], ], ], ], and ]. Research practices associated with women's studies place women and the experiences of women at the center of inquiry through the use of quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods. Feminist researchers acknowledge their role in the production of knowledge and make explicit the relationship between the researcher and the research subject.<ref name=":02"/>

=== Feminist theory ===

] refers to the body of writing that works to address gender discrimination and disparities, while acknowledging, describing, and analyzing the experiences and conditions of women's lives.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Feminist theory: a reader|last1=Kolmar|first1=Wendy K.|last2=Bartkowski|first2=Frances|year=2013|publisher=McGraw-Hill Higher Education|isbn=9780073512358|edition=4th|location=New York|page=2|oclc=800352585}}</ref> Theorists and writers such as ], ], ], and ] added to the field of feminist theory with respect to the ways in which race and gender mutually inform the experiences of women of color with works such as '']'' (hooks), '']'' (Walker), and '']'' (Collins). Alice Walker coined the term ] to situate black women's experiences as they struggle for social change and liberation, while simultaneously celebrating the strength of black women, their culture, and their beauty.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Womanist reader|date=2006|publisher=Routledge|last=Phillips|first=Layli|isbn=9780415954112|location=New York|oclc=64585764}}</ref> Patricia Hill Collin's contributed the concept of the "]" to feminist theory, which reconceptualized race, class, and gender as interlocking systems of oppression that shape experiences of privilege and oppression.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Black feminist thought: knowledge, consciousness, and the politics of empowerment|first=Patricia Hill|last=Collins|isbn=9780415964722|edition=2nd|location=New York|oclc=245597448|year=2009}}</ref>
]

=== Intersectionality ===

] is a way of understanding and analyzing the complexity in people, human experiences, and society.<ref name=":2">{{Cite book|last1=Hill Collins|first1=P.|title=Intersectionality|last2=Bilge|first2=S.|publisher=Polity Press|year=2016|isbn=978-0-7456-8448-2|location=Cambridge, UK}}</ref> Associated with the ] of feminism, ]'s theory of ] has become the key theoretical framework through which various feminist scholars discuss the relationship of between one's social and political identities such as gender, race, age, and sexual orientation, and received societal discrimination.<ref name="Cooper 2016">{{cite book |last1=Cooper |first1=Brittney |editor1-last=Disch |editor1-first=Lisa |editor2-first=Mary |editor2-last=Hawkesworth |chapter=Intersectionality |title=The Oxford Handbook of Feminist Theory |year=2016 |pages=385–406 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-932858-1 |doi=10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199328581.013.20}}</ref> Intersectionality posits that these relationships must be considered to understand hierarchies of power and privilege, as well as the effects in which they manifest in an individual's life.<ref name="Carastathis 2014">{{cite journal |last1=Carastathis |first1=Anna |title=The Concept of Intersectionality in Feminist Theory |journal=Philosophy Compass |year=2014 |volume=9 |issue=5 |pages=304–314 |doi=10.1111/phc3.12129 |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/263725959 |via=ResearchGate}}</ref> Though events and conditions of social and political life are often thought to be shaped by one factor, intersectionality theorizes that oppression and social inequality are a result of how powerful individuals view the combination of various factors; emphasizing that discrimination is accounted for by power, not personal identity.<ref name=":2" /><ref name="Cooper 2016" />

=== Standpoint theory ===

], also classified as feminist standpoint theory,<ref name=":03">{{Cite journal|title=Loyalism, Women and Standpoint Theory|last=Potter|first=M|journal=Irish Political Studies|year=2014|volume=29|issue=2|pages=258–274|doi=10.1080/07907184.2012.727399|s2cid=145719308}}</ref> developed in the 1980s as a way of critically examining the production of knowledge and its resulting effects on practices of power.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Harding|first=Sandra G.|title=The feminist standpoint theory reader: intellectual and political controversies|publisher=Routledge|year=2004|isbn=978-0415945004|location=New York|page=2|oclc=51668081}}</ref> Standpoint theory operates from the idea that knowledge is socially situated and underrepresented groups and minorities have historically been ignored or marginalized when it comes to the production of knowledge. Emerging from Marxist thought, standpoint theory argues for analysis that challenges the authority of political and social "truths".<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Hekman|first=Susan|year=1997|title=Truth and Method: Feminist Standpoint Theory Revisited|journal=Signs|volume=22|issue=2|pages=341–365|doi=10.1086/495159|jstor=3175275|s2cid=13884397}}</ref> Standpoint theory, assumes that power lies solely within the hands of the male gender as the process of decision making in society is constructed exclusively for, and by men.<ref name=":03" /> An example of where standpoint theory presents itself in society is through the processes of political analysis, as this field of study is almost entirely controlled by men.<ref name=":03" /> Furthermore, from a Marxist viewpoint, Karl Marx had expressed a notion in which believed that those in power have the inability to understand the perspectives of those whom they hold power.<ref name=":03" /> Providing that standpoint theory acknowledges the male incapability of understanding the oppression in which women face in society.

=== Transnational feminist theory ===

] is concerned with the flow of social, political, and economic equality of women and men across borders; directly in response to globalization, neoliberalism, and imperialism.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Moghadam|first=Valentine M.|title=Women worldwide: transnational feminist perspectives on women|date=2011|publisher=McGraw-Hill|isbn=9780073512297|editor1-last=Lee|editor1-first=Janet|location=New York, NY|pages=15|chapter=Transnational Feminisms|oclc=436028205|editor2-last=Shaw|editor2-first=Susan M.}}</ref> Women's studies began incorporating transnational feminist theory into its curricula as a way to disrupt and challenge the ways in which knowledge regarding gender is prioritized, transmitted, and circulated in the field and academy.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Parisi|first=Laura|title=Rethinking women's and gender studies|publisher=Routledge|year=2012|isbn=9780415808316|editor1-last=Orr|editor1-first=Catherine Margaret|location=New York|pages=326|chapter=Transnational|oclc=738351967|editor2-last=Braithwaite|editor2-first=Ann|editor3-last=Lichtenstein|editor3-first=Diane Marilyn}}</ref> Transnational feminist theory is continually challenging the traditional divides of society, in which are crucial to ongoing politics and cultural beliefs.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Minoo|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iZqv_ZcsipgC&q=transnational+feminist+theory&pg=PA349|title=Between Woman and Nation: Nationalisms, Transnational Feminisms, and the State|publisher=Duke University Press|year=1999|isbn=978-0-8223-2322-8|language=en}}</ref> A key recognition advanced from the transnational feminist perspective is that gender is, has been, and will continue to be, a global effort.<ref name=":3">{{Cite journal|title=Transnational Feminism and Communication Studies: The Communication Review, 9(4), 255–267.|last=Shome|first=R.|year=2006|doi=10.1080/10714420600957266|s2cid=145239698}}</ref> Furthermore, a transnational feminist perspective perpetuates that a lack of attention to the cultural and economic injustices of gender, as a result of globalization, may aid in the reinforcing of global gender inequalities; though, this can only come about when one occupies globally privileged subject positions.<ref name=":3" />

=== Social justice ===

Since its inception and connection with the women's movement, activism has been a foundation of women's studies. Increasingly ] has become a key component of women's studies courses, programs, and departments. Social justice theory is concerned with the fight for just communities, not on the individual level, but for the whole of society.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Social Justice: Theories, Issues, and Movements|url=https://archive.org/details/socialjusticethe00milo|url-access=limited|last1=Capeheart|last2=Milovanovic|first2=Dragan|first1=Loretta|year=2007|publisher=Rutgers University Press|isbn=9780813541686|location=Piscataway|page=|oclc=437192947}}</ref> Women's studies students engage in social justice projects, although some scholars and critics are concerned about requiring students to engage in both mandated activism and/or social justice work.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Johnson |first1=Jennifer L. |first2=Susanne |last2=Luhmann |title=Social Justice for (University) Credit? The Women's and Gender Studies Practicum in the Neoliberal University. (Report) |journal=Resources for Feminist Research |volume=34 |issue=3–4 |year=2016 |page=40}}</ref> Women's studies not only focus on concepts such as domestic violence, discrimination in the workplace, and gender differences in the division of labor at home, but gives a foundation for understanding the root cause of these concepts, which is the first step to making for a better life for women.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.depts.ttu.edu/wstudies/advising_whystudywgs.php|title=Women's and Gender Studies|website=Texas Tech University}}</ref>

=== Agency ===
Agency may be defined as the capability to make choices individually and freely.<ref name=":4">{{Cite book|last=Barker|first=C.|title=Cultural Studies: Theory and Practice|publisher=Sage|year=2005|isbn=0-7619-4156-8|location=London}}</ref> An individual's agency may be restricted due to various social factors, such as gender, race, religion and social class.<ref name=":4" /> From a feminist standpoint, agency may be viewed as an attempt to equalize the one-sided oppression that has characterized first wave feminism.<ref name=":5">{{Cite journal|title=Agency, Anticipation and Indeterminacy in Feminist Theory. Feminist Theory, 4(2), 139–148|last=Mcnay|first=L|year=2003|doi=10.1177/14647001030042003|s2cid=143574634}}</ref> Feminists use agency in attempt to create new forms of autonomy and dependence from the reshaping of gender relations that is taking place in global society.<ref name=":5" /> Women's studies acknowledges the lack of agency in which women historically possessed, due to hierarchical positions in society. Feminists are actively making an effort to increase gender equality, as it may result in expanding social agency for all women.<ref name=":5" />

=== Materialism ===
Materialist theory derives from 1960s and 1970s social work in feminism.<ref name=":6">{{Cite web|url=https://www.cjc-online.ca/index.php/journal/article/view/1118/1024|title=Materialist Feminism: A Reader in Class, Difference, and Women's Lives: Canadian Journal of Communication|last1=Hennessy|first1=R.|last2=Ingraham|first2=C.|year=1999}}</ref> Materialism possesses significant ties to the Marxist theories of history, agency, and ideology; though, may be distinguished through the incorporation of language and culture to its philosophy.<ref name=":6" /> Materialism poses questions to both social analytics and social relations, in which may be found in the material conditions of any given society.<ref name=":6" /> In addition from examining from a gender standpoint, material conditions are studied in relation to realistic aspects of women's lives.<ref name=":6" /> A key aspect in which materialist feminists have revealed these relations is from the feminist perspective, claiming that social conditions of gender are historically situated, as well as subjected to intervention and change.<ref name=":6" /> Materialist feminism specifically focuses on social arrangements that accentuate the role of women notably the aspects of family, domesticity, and motherhood.<ref name=":6" /> Materialism analyzes gendering discourses in which promote women's marginalization; Thus, one of the most influential aspects of materialist feminism is its attentiveness with questions of ideology and how they relate to history and agency.<ref name=":6" />

=== Pedagogies ===
In most institutions, women's studies courses employ ] in a triad model of equal parts research, theory, and praxis. The decentralization of the professor as the source of knowledge is often fundamental to women's studies classroom culture.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Shrewsbury|first=Carolyn M.|date=Fall 1987|title=What is feminist pedagogy?|journal=Women's Studies Quarterly |volume=15|issue=3–4|pages=6–14|jstor=40003432}}
* ''See also'': {{Cite journal|last=Shrewsbury|first=Carolyn M.|date=Fall 1993|title=What is feminist pedagogy?|journal=Women's Studies Quarterly |volume=21|issue=3–4|pages=8–16|jstor=40022001}}</ref> Students are encouraged to take an active role in "claiming" their education, taking responsibility for themselves and the learning process.<ref>{{cite book |last=Rich |first=Adrienne |chapter=Claiming an Education |title=Open Questions |editor1-first=Chris |editor1-last=Anderson |editor2-first=Lex |editor2-last=Runciman |location=New York |publisher=Bedford/St. Martin's |year=2005 |pages=608–611}}</ref> Women's studies programs and courses are designed to explore the ] of gender, race, sexuality, class and other topics that are involved in identity politics and societal norms through a ] lens. Women's studies courses focus on a variety of topics such as media literacy, sexuality, race and ethnicity, history involving women, queer theory, multiculturalism and other courses closely related. Faculty incorporate these components into classes across a variety of topics, including popular culture, women in the economy, reproductive and ], and women's health across the lifespan.<ref>{{cite book|title=Transforming Scholarship|last1=Berger|first1=Michele Tracy|date=2015|publisher=Routledge|edition=Second|location=Abingdon, Oxon|pages=35–40}}</ref>

Women's studies programs are involved in social justice work and often design curricula that are embedded with theory and activism outside of the classroom setting. Some women's studies programs offer internships that are community-based allowing students the opportunity to experience how institutional structures of privilege and oppression directly affects women's lives. Women's studies curricula often encourage students to participate in ] activities in addition to discussion and reflection upon course materials. However, ], from the ], has criticized this aspect of women's studies programs, arguing that they place politics over education, stating "the strategies of faculty members in these programs have included policing insensitive language, championing research methods deemed congenial to women (such as qualitative over quantitative methods), and conducting classes as if they were therapy sessions."<ref name="Patai">{{cite journal|url=http://userpages.umbc.edu/~korenman/wmst/fem_overhaul.html|title=Why Not A Feminist Overhaul of Higher Education?|last=Patai|first=Daphne|date=23 January 1998|journal=Chronicle of Higher Education|access-date=4 May 2007}}</ref> Since women's studies students analyze identity markers including gender, race, class, and sexuality, this often results in dissecting institutionalized structures of power. As a result of these pedagogies, women's studies students leave university with a tool set to make social change and do something about power inequalities in society.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bubriski |first1=Anne |last2=Semaan |first2=Ingrid |year=2009 |title=Activist Learning vs. Service Learning in a Women's Studies Classroom |journal=Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-Knowledge |volume=7 |issue=3 |pages=91–98}}</ref>

Notable women's studies scholars include ], ], ], ], ], ], ], and ].

== Internal academic criticism ==
In the book ''Professing Feminism: Education and Indoctrination in Women's Studies'', thirty Women's Studies academics came together to criticise the "unhealthy conditions and self-destructive tendencies that appear to be intrinsic to many Women's Studies programs". Professors spoke of being unable to "discuss their concerns about this belligerent anti-intellectualism with other faculty members in Women's Studies", with claims of a "constant emphasis on political purity.... from both students and professors".<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Patai |first1=DAPHNE |title=Professing feminism: education and indoctrination in women's studies |last2=Koertge |first2=Noretta |publisher=HarperCollins |year=2003 |isbn=9780739104552 |location=United States |pages=13, 18 |language=English}}</ref>

== See also ==
* ]
* '']''
* '']''
* '']''
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]

==Notes==
{{reflist|30em}}


==References== ==References==
* Borland, K. (1991). That's not what I said: Interpretive conflict in oral narrative research. In Giuck, S. & Patai, D. (Eds.), Women's Words: The Feminist Practice of Oral History (pp.&nbsp;63–76). NY: Routledge
<references/>
* Brooks, A. (2007). Feminist standpoint epistemology: Building knowledge and empowerment through women's lived experiences. In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;53–82). CA: Sage Publications.
* Brooks, A. & Hesse-Biber, S.N. (2007). An invitation to feminist research. In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;1–24). CA: Sage Publications.
* Buch, E.D. & Staller, K.M. (2007). The feminist practice of ethnography. In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;187–221). CA: Sage Publications.
* Dill, T.B & Zambrana, R. (2009) Emerging Intersections: Race, Class and Gender in Theory, Policy and Practice. NJ: Rutgers University Press.
* Fausto-Sterling, Anne (2000). Sexing the body: gender politics and the construction of sexuality. New York: Basic Books. {{ISBN|0-465-07714-5}}.
* Halse, C. & Honey, A. (2005). Unraveling ethics: Illuminating the moral dilemmas of research ethics. Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 30 (4), 2141–2162.
* Harding, S. (1987). Introduction: Is there a feminist method? In Harding, S. (ed.), Feminism & Methodology. (pp.&nbsp;1–14). IN: Indiana University Press.
* Hesse-Biber, S.N. (2007). The practice of feminist in-depth interviewing. In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;111–148). CA: Sage Publications.
* Hyam, M. (2004). Hearing girls' silences: Thoughts on the politics and practices of a feminist method of group discussion. Gender, Place, and Culture, 11 (1), 105–119.
* Leavy, P.L. (2007a). Feminist postmodernism and poststructuralism. In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;83–108). CA: Sage Publications.
* Leavy, P.L. (2007b). The practice of feminist oral history and focus group interviews. In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;149–186). CA: Sage Publications.
* Leavy, P.L. (2007c). The feminist practice of content analysis. In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;223–248). CA: Sage Publications.
* Leckenby, D. (2007). Feminist empiricism: Challenging gender bias and "setting the record straight." In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;27–52). CA: Sage Publications.
* Lykes, M.B. & Coquillon, E. (2006). Participatory and Action Research and feminisms: Towards Transformative Praxis. In Sharlene Hesse-Biber (Ed.). Handbook of Feminist Research: Theory and Praxis. CA: Sage Publications.
* Miner-Rubino, K. & Jayaratne, T.E. (2007). Feminist survey research. In Hesse-Biber, S.N. & Leavy, P.L. (Eds.), Feminist Research Practice (pp.&nbsp;293–325). CA: Sage Publications.

== Further reading ==
* Berkin, Carol R., Judith L. Pinch, and Carole S. Appel, ''Exploring Women's Studies: Looking Forward, Looking Back'', 2005, {{ISBN|0-13-185088-1}} {{oclc|57391427}}
* {{cite book
|last=Boxer
|first=Marilyn J.
|title=When Women ask the Questions: Creating Women's Studies in America
|year=1998
|publisher=Johns Hopkins University Press
|location=Baltimore, MD
|isbn=978-0-8018-5834-5
|oclc=37981599
|url=https://archive.org/details/whenwomenaskques0000boxe
}}
* {{cite book
|last1=Carter
|first1=Sarah
|first2=Maureen
|last2=Ritchie
|title=Women's Studies: A Guide to Information Sources
|url=https://archive.org/details/womensstudiesgui0000cart
|url-access=registration
|year=1990
|publisher=Mansell and McFarland
|location=London, England and Jefferson, NC
|isbn=978-0-7201-2058-5
|oclc=20392079}}
* {{cite book
|last=Committee on Women's Studies in Asia
|title=Changing Lives: Life Stories of Asian Pioneers in Women's Studies
|year=1995
|publisher=Feminist Press at the City University of New York
|location=New York, NY
|isbn=978-1-55861-108-5
|oclc=31867161
|url=https://archive.org/details/changingliveslif00comm
}}
* Davis, Angela Y. (2003). Are Prisons Obsolete?, Open Media (April 2003), {{ISBN|1-58322-581-1}}
* {{cite book
|editor1-last=Davis
|editor1-first=Kathy
|editor2-first=Mary
|editor2-last=Evans
|editor3-first=Judith
|editor3-last=Lorber
|title=Handbook of Gender and Women's Studies
|year=2006
|publisher=Sage
|location=London, England; Thousand Oaks, CA
|isbn=978-0-7619-4390-7
|oclc=69392297}}
* Fausto-Sterling, Anne (1992). ''Myths of gender: biological theories about women and men''. New York: BasicBooks. {{ISBN|0-465-04792-0}}.
* Fausto-Sterling, Anne (2000). ''Sexing the body: gender politics and the construction of sexuality''. New York: Basic Books. {{ISBN|0-465-07714-5}}.
* Fausto-Sterling, Anne (2012). ''Sex/Gender: Biology in a Social World''. New York: Routledge. {{ISBN|9780415881456}}.
* {{Cite journal | last = Gardey | first = Delphine |author-link=Delphine Gardey | title = 'Territory Trouble': Feminist Studies and (the Question of) Hospitality | journal = ] | volume = 27 | issue = 2 | pages = 125–152 | doi = 10.1215/10407391-3621745 | date = September 2016 | url = https://archive-ouverte.unige.ch/unige:86893 }}
* ] and Caren Kaplan, ''An Introduction to Women's Studies: Gender in a Transnational World'', 2006, {{ISBN|0-07-109380-X}} {{oclc|47161269}}
* {{cite book
|last=Griffin |first=Gabriele
|title=Doing Women's Studies: Employment Opportunities, Personal Impacts and Social Consequences
|year=2005
|publisher=Zed Books in association with the University of Hull and the European Union
|location=London, England
|isbn=978-1-84277-501-1
|oclc=56641855}}
* Ginsberg, Alice E. ''The Evolution of American Women's Studies: Reflections on Triumphs, Controversies and Change'' (Palgrave Macmillan: 2009).
* Griffin, Gabriele and ] (eds.), ''Thinking Differently: A Reader in European Women's Studies'', London etc.: Zed Books, 2002 {{ISBN|1-84277-002-0}} {{oclc|49375751}}
* Howe, Florence (ed.), ''The Politics of Women's Studies: Testimony from Thirty Founding Mothers'', Paperback edition, New York: Feminist Press 2001, {{ISBN|1-55861-241-6}} {{oclc|44313456}}
* {{cite book
|author=Hunter College Women's Studies Collective
|title=Women's Realities, Women's Choices: An Introduction to Women's Studies
|year=2005 |edition=3rd
|publisher=Oxford University Press
|location=New York, NY
|isbn=978-0-19-515035-3
|oclc=55870949}}
* {{cite book
|last=Jacobs
|first=Sue-Ellen
|title=Women in Perspective: A Guide for Cross-Cultural Studies
|year=1974
|publisher=University of Illinois Press
|location=Urbana, IL
|isbn=978-0-252-00299-1
|oclc=1050797
|url=https://archive.org/details/womeninperspecti00suee
}}
* {{cite book
|last1=Kennedy
|first1=Elizabeth Lapovsky
|author-link=Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy
|first2=Agatha
|last2=Beins
|title= Women's Studies for the Future: Foundations, Interrogations, Politics
|year=2005
|publisher=Rutgers University Press
|location=New Brunswick, NJ
|isbn=978-0-8135-3618-7
|oclc=56951279}}
* {{cite book
|last1=Krikos
|first1=Linda A.
|first2=Cindy
|last2=Ingold
|title=Women's Studies: A Recommended Bibliography
|year=2004
|edition=3rd
|publisher=Libraries Unlimited
|location=Westport, CN
|isbn=978-1-56308-566-6
|oclc=54079621
|url=https://archive.org/details/womensstudiesrec0003krik
}}
* {{cite book
|last=Larson |first=Andrea and R. Edward Freeman
|title=Women's Studies and Business Ethics: Toward a New Conversation
|year=1997
|publisher=Oxford University Press
|location=New York, NY
|isbn=978-0-19-510758-6
|oclc=35762696}}
* Lederman, Muriel, and Ingrid Bartsch, eds. ''The Gender and Science Reader''. New York: Routledge, 2001. Print.
* {{cite book
|last1=Loeb
|first1=Catherine
|first2=Susan E.
|last2=Searing
|first3=Esther F.
|last3=Lanigan
|title=Women's Studies: A Recommended Core Bibliography, 1980–1985
|year=1987
|publisher=Libraries Unlimited
|location=Littleton, CO
|isbn=978-0-87287-472-5
|oclc=14716751
|url=https://archive.org/details/womensstudiesrec00loebrich
}}
* {{cite book
|last1=Luebke
|first1=Barbara F.
|first2=Mary Ellen
|last2=Reilly
|title=Women's Studies Graduates: The First Generation
|year=1995
|publisher=Teachers College Press, Teachers College, Columbia University
|location=New York, NY
|isbn=978-0-8077-6274-5
|oclc=31076831
|url=https://archive.org/details/womensstudiesgra0000lueb
}}
* {{cite book
|last=MacNabb
|first=Elizabeth L.
|title=Transforming the Disciplines: A Women's Studies Primer
|year=2001
|publisher=Haworth Press
|location=New York, NY
|isbn=978-1-56023-959-8
|oclc=44118091
|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9781560239604
}}
* Messer-Davidow, Ellen, ''Disciplining Feminism: From Social Activism to Academic Discourse'', Durham, NC etc.: Duke University Press, 2002 {{ISBN|0-8223-2829-1}} {{oclc|47705543}}
* ]. ''Dislocating Cultures: Identities, Traditions, and Third-World Feminism''. Routledge, 1997. ISBN 9780415914192
* Orr, Catherine; Braithwaite, Ann; Lichtenstein, Diane (2012). ''Rethinking Women's and Gender Studies''. New York: Routledge. {{ISBN|9780415808309}}
* {{cite book
|last1=Patai
|first1=Daphne
|first2=Noretta
|last2=Koertge
|title=Professing Feminism: Education and Indoctrination in Women's Studies
|year=2003 |edition=New and Expanded
|publisher=Lexington Books
|location=Lanham, MD
|isbn=978-0-7391-0454-5
|oclc=50228164}}
* {{cite book
|last=Rao
|first=Aruna
|title=Women's Studies International: Nairobi and Beyond
|year=1991
|publisher=Feminist Press at the City University of New York
|location=New York, NY
|isbn=978-1-55861-031-6
|oclc=22490140
|url=https://archive.org/details/womensstudiesint0000raoa
}}
* {{cite book
|last1=Rogers
|first1=Mary F.
|first2=C. D.
|last2=Garrett
|title=Who's Afraid of Women's Studies?: Feminisms in Everyday Life
|year=2002
|publisher=AltaMira Press
|location=Walnut Creek, CA
|oclc=50530054
|isbn=978-0-7591-0173-9
|url=https://archive.org/details/whosafraidofwome0000roge
}}
* {{cite book
|last=Rosenberg |first=Roberta
|title=Women's Studies: An Interdisciplinary Anthology
|year=2001
|publisher=Peter Lang
|location=New York, NY
|isbn=978-0-8204-4443-7
|oclc=45115816}}
* Schiebinger, Londa. ''Has Feminism Changed Science?''. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999. Print.
* Ruth, Sheila, ''Issues In Feminism: An Introduction to Women's Studies'', 2000, {{ISBN|0-7674-1644-9}} {{oclc|43978372}}
* {{cite book
|last=Simien |first=Evelyn M.
|editor1-first=Kristin
|editor1-last=Waters
|editor2-first=Carol B.
|editor2-last=Conaway
|title=Black Women's Intellectual Traditions: Speaking their Minds
|year=2007
|publisher=University of Vermont Press and the University Press of New England
|location=Burlington, VT and Hanover, NH
|isbn=978-1-58465-633-3
|chapter=Black Feminist Theory: Charting a Course for Black Women's Studies in Political Science
|oclc=76140356}}
* {{cite book
|last=Tierney |first=Helen
|title=Women's Studies Encyclopedia
|year=1989–1991
|publisher=Greenwood Press
|location=New York, NY
|isbn=978-0-313-24646-3
|oclc=18779445}}
* Wiegman, Robyn (editor), ''Women's Studies on Its Own: A Next Wave Reader in Institutional Change'', Duke University Press, 2002. {{ISBN|0-8223-2950-6}} {{oclc|49421587}}


==External links== == External links ==
{{wikiversity inline|Women's Studies}}
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* *
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* Karen Lerhman, '''', ''Mother Jones'', September 1993
*
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* (key founder of the Institute for Women's and Gender Studies at the University of Toronto) held at the


{{fem-stub}} {{Feminist theory}}


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Latest revision as of 12:02, 12 December 2024

Academic field that places women's lives and experiences at the center of study "Feminist studies" redirects here. For the journal, see Feminist Studies.

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Women's studies is an academic field that draws on feminist and interdisciplinary methods to place women's lives and experiences at the center of study, while examining social and cultural constructs of gender; systems of privilege and oppression; and the relationships between power and gender as they intersect with other identities and social locations such as race, sexual orientation, socio-economic class, and disability.

Popular concepts that are related to the field of women's studies include feminist theory, standpoint theory, intersectionality, multiculturalism, transnational feminism, social justice, affect studies, agency, bio-politics, materialism, and embodiment. Research practices and methodologies associated with women's studies include ethnography, autoethnography, focus groups, surveys, community-based research, discourse analysis, and reading practices associated with critical theory, post-structuralism, and queer theory. The field researches and critiques different societal norms of gender, race, class, sexuality, and other social inequalities.

Women's studies is related to the fields of gender studies, feminist studies, and sexuality studies, and more broadly related to the fields of cultural studies, ethnic studies, and African-American studies.

Women's studies courses are now offered in over seven hundred institutions in the United States, and globally in more than forty countries.

History

Africa

The erasure of women and their activities in Africa was complex. When women's studies emerged in the 1980s, it focused on recovering women from the obscurity of all of African history caused by colonialism and the "patriarchal social systems" left behind in Africa after decolonization. Because systems prevailed which supported boys' education over that of girls, in the era following independence there were few women who could read and write. Those who could were not encouraged to become professionals and often resorted to activism to address educational and other disadvantages women faced in the 1960s and 1970s. The first generation of scholars focused on establishing and legitimizing Africa's precolonial history. They also questioned whether the Western construct of gender applied in Africa or whether the concepts of gender existed in pre-colonial Africa.

Ifi Amadiume's work Male Daughters, Female Husbands (1987) and Oyeronke Oyewumi's The Invention of Women (1997) are some of the first works which sought to examine gender perceptions in Africa. In 1977, the Association of African Women for Research and Development (AAWORD) was established to promote research on African women by African women. Scholars affiliated with the organization from its founding included: Simi Afonja (Nigeria), N'Dri Thérèse Assié-Lumumba (Ivory Coast), (Bolanle Awe (Nigeria), Nawal El Saadawi (Egypt), Nina Mba (Nigeria), Omolara Ogundipe-Leslie (Nigeria), Achola Pala Okeyo (Kenya), Filomena Steady (Sierra Leone), Fatou Sow (Senegal), and Zenebework Tadesse (Ethiopia). Other scholars joined Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN), a network for feminist academics and activists focused on the Global South, created in 1984. African scholars among DAWN's founding members were Fatema Mernissi (Morocco), Pala Okeyo (Kenya), and Marie-Angélique Savané (Senegal). These scholars inspired a second group of researchers and activists, which included: Rudo Gaidzanwa (Zimbabwe), Ayesha Imam (Nigeria), Patricia McFadden (Eswatini), Amina Mama (Nigeria), Takyiwaa Manuh (Ghana), Maria Nzomo (Kenya), and Charmaine Pereira (Nigeria). The University of Ghana established the Development and Women's Studies Program (DAWS) in 1989, which by 1996 offered both undergraduate and graduate level studies. After the demise of Apartheid, the University of Cape Town, South Africa established the African Gender Institute in 1996 to facilitate research and gender studies in Africa. By 2003, full departments dedicated to gender and women's studies had also been established at Makerere University (Uganda), the University of Buea (Cameroon), and the University of Zambia (Zambia).

Americas

The first accredited women's studies course in the U.S. was held in 1969 at Cornell University. After a year of intense organizing of women's consciousness raising groups, rallies, petition circulating, and operating unofficial or experimental classes and presentations before seven committees and assemblies, the first women's studies program in the United States was established in 1970 at San Diego State College (now San Diego State University). In conjunction with National Women's Liberation Movement, students and community members created the ad hoc committee for women's studies. The second women's studies program in the United States was established in 1971 at Wichita State University in Wichita, Kansas. It was mostly formed through many efforts by women in the English department, administration and within the community. By 1974, San Diego State University faculty members began a nationwide campaign for the integration of the department. At the time, these actions and the field were extremely political. Before formalized departments and programs, many women's studies courses were advertised unofficially around campuses and taught by women faculty members – without pay – in addition to their established teaching and administrative responsibilities. Then, as in many cases today, faculty who teach in women's studies often hold faculty appointments in other departments on campus.

The first scholarly journal in interdisciplinary women's studies, Feminist Studies, began publishing in 1972. The National Women's Studies Association (of the United States) was established in 1977.

In 1977, there were 276 women's studies programs nationwide in the United States. The number of programs increased in the following decade, growing up to 530 programs in 1989, which included the program at the University of Puerto Rico founded by Margarita Benítez in 1986. Around the 1980s, universities in the U.S. saw the growth and development of women's studies courses and programs across the country while the field continued to grapple with backlash from both conservative groups and concerns from those within the women's movement about the white, existentialist, and heterosexual privilege of those in the academy.

In Canada The first few university courses in Women's Studies were taught in the early 1970s. In 1984 the federal government established five regional endowed chairs in Women's Studies for each region of the country at:

  • Simon Fraser University (British Columbia),
  • University of Winnipeg and University of Manitoba (Prairies, joint chair)
  • Carleton University and the University of Ottawa (Ontario, joint chair),
  • Université Laval (Quebec), and
  • Mount St Vincent University (Atlantic Canada).

Around the same time, women academics in Latin America began to form women's studies groups. The first chair of women's studies in Mexico was created in the political and social sciences faculty of the National Autonomous University of Mexico in 1970. Starting in 1979, the Grupo Autónomo de Mujeres Universitarias (GAMU, Autonomous Group of University Women), which included both Mexican faculty and students began meeting periodically to discuss how feminism could be introduced to various campuses across the country. In 1982, a women's studies program was created at the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco. Similarly in 1983, activists in the Mexican feminist movement, including Lourdes Arizpe, Flora Botton, and Elena Urrutia, founded the Programa Interdisciplinario de Estudios de la Mujer (PIEG, Interdisciplinary Women's Studies Program) at El Colegio de México in Mexico City. In 1984, academics formed the Centro de Estudios de la Mujer (Center for Women's Studies) in the psychology faculty at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. The field was formalized with the creation of the Programa Universitario de Estudios de Género (PUEG, University Program on Gender Studies) in 1992, at the urging of academics like Gloria Careaga, Teresita de Barbieri, Graciela Hierro [es], Araceli Mingo, Lorenia Parada, and Alicia Elena Pérez Duarte.

Activists and researchers in Chile began meeting in 1978 with creation of the Círculo de la Mujer (Women's Circle). In 1984, they founded the Centro de Estudios de la Mujer (CEM, Center for Women's Studies) in Santiago to facilitate multi-disciplinary studies on women and gender. That same year, Virginia Vargas began teaching women's studies in Peru, and the following year, she along with Virginia Guzmán Barcos and others, founded the Flora Tristán Peruvian Women's Center. The center provided a research facility for women scholars and provided publishing for their works. From the early 1980s, women like Juanita Barreto Gama, Guiomar Dueñas Vargas, Florence Thomas, Magdalena León Gómez, María Martínez, Donny Meertens, Yolanda Puyana Villamizar [wikidata], María Himelda Ramírez and Ana Rico de Alonso worked to create an interdisciplinary field of feminist study in Colombia. First they met informally, then were able to gain official recognition in 1985 as the Grupo de Estudios Mujer y Sociedad (Women & Society Study Group) and finally in 1994, they launched the Programa de Estudios de Género, Mujer y Desarrollo (PGMD, Gender, Women and Development Studies Program) in the Human Sciences Department at the National University of Colombia.

In 1985, activists in Argentina launched the "Introduction to Women's Studies" and a post-graduate seminar, "La construcción social del género sexual" (The Social Construction of Sexual Gender) at the University of Buenos Aires. In 1987, María Fernández became the chair of UBA's degree program in women's studies. In 1992, the Area Interdisciplinaria de Estudios de la Mujer (AIEM, Interdisciplinary Area of Women's Studies), which became the Instituto Interdisciplinario de Estudios de Género (Interdisciplinary Institute of Gender Studies) in 1997, was founded at UBA linking academics from the faculties of Arts, Anthropology, Classics and Letters, Education, History, Languages, and Philosophy to encourage broader research and analysis of women in these fields. Hilda Habichayn founded the Centro de Estudios Históricos sobre las Mujeres (Center for Historical Studies on Women), which began in 1993 to offer the first master's degree in women's studies in Latin America.

The first women's study program in Paraguay was the Centro Paraguayo de estudios de la Mujer (Paraguayan Center of Women's Studies) at the Universidad Católica "Nuestra Señora de la Asunción". It was founded in 1983 by Olga Caballero, Manuelita Escobar, Marilyn Godoy and Edy Irigoitia. The Grupo de Estudios de la Mujer Paraguaya (GEMPA, Paraguayan Women's Studies Group) was founded at the Paraguayan Center for Sociological Studies in 1985 by Graziella Corvalán and Mirtha Rivarola. Gender studies also began to be established in universities in Brazil in the 1980s and continued expanding throughout the 1990s. In 1992, Brazilian academics at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro launched Revista Estudos Feministas, one of the primary academic journals on gender in Brazil. Among the contributors for the inaugural issue were Ana Arruda Callado [pt], Heloísa Buarque de Hollanda, Maria Carneiro da Cunha, Mary Garcia Castro [pt], Rosiska Darcy de Oliveira, Valéria Lamego, Miriam Moreira Leite, Leila Linhares, Heleieth Saffioti, Bila Sorj, and others.

The political aims of the feminist movement that compelled the formation of women's studies found itself at odds with the institutionalized academic feminism of the 1990s. As "woman" as a concept continued to be expanded, the exploration of social constructions of gender led to the field's expansion into both gender studies and sexuality studies. The field of women's studies continued to grow during the 1990s and into the 2000s with the expansion of universities offering majors, minors, and certificates in women's studies, gender studies, and feminist studies. The first official PhD program in Women's Studies was established at Emory University in 1990. As of 2012, there were 16 institutions offering a PhD in Women's Studies in the United States. Since then, UC Santa Cruz (2013), the University of Kentucky-Lexington (2013), Stony Brook University (2014), and Oregon State University (2016) also introduced a PhD in the field.

Australia

In 1956, Australian feminist Madge Dawson took up a lectureship in the Department of Adult Education at Sydney University and began researching and teaching on the status of women. Dawson's course, "Women in a Changing World", which focused on the socio-economic and political status of women in western Europe, becoming one of the first women's studies courses.

Asia

Central Asia

In 2015 at Kabul University, the first master's degree course in gender and women's studies in Afghanistan began.

Europe

Elizabeth Bird traced the development of Women's Studies in the UK out of informal education run by the women's liberation movement (WLM), the Workers' Educational Association, "CR" or "consciousness raising" groups, left-wing activist groups, and extramural departments attached to universities and colleges. Bird notes that, according to feminist activists and scholars Anna Coote and Beatrix Campbell who interviewed many participants in the 1960s-70s development of women's studies, "in the summer of 1969 Juliet Mitchell taught a short course entitled 'The Role of Women in Society' in the 'Anti University', which had been organised by radical academics as part of the student protest movement". Maggie Humm identifies this summer course as "Britain's first women's studies course".

In 1975, Margarita Rendel, Oonagh Hartnett, Zoe Fairbairns, wrote a guide outlining the 17 then-existing undergraduate courses, 1 postgraduate option, four college of education offers and six polytechnics courses in Women's Studies – often called 'women in society' – in the United Kingdom. They compiled the guide from surveys of UK universities and adding to research previously published by Sue Beardon and Erika Stevenson for the National Union of Students in 1974.

A part time postgraduate Diploma in Women's Studies was offered by The Polytechnic of Central London from 1977, and in 1978 an MA course on the subject of 'Rights', including women's rights, was organised by Margarita Rendel at the London Institute of Education.

In 1980, the University of Kent launched the first named MA degree in Women's Studies, with Mary Evans leading the development of the course. Following Kent, Bradford (1982), Sheffield City Polytechnic (1983), Warwick (1983) and York (1984) opened MA courses. In 1990, part-time BAs in Women's Studies launched at the Polytechnic of North East London and at Preston Polytechnic. Veronica Beechey was recruited by the Open University in 1983 to initiate a women's studies course there.

Current courses in Women's Studies in the United Kingdom can be found through the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service.

Theoretical traditions and research methods

Students of Women and Gender Studies University of Haifa

Early women's studies courses and curricula were often driven by the question "Why are women not included? Where are the women?". That is, as more women became more present in higher education as both students and faculty, questions arose about the male-centric nature of most courses and curricula. Women faculty in traditional departments such as history, English, and philosophy began to offer courses with a focus on women. Drawing from the women's movement's notion that "the personal is political", courses also began to develop around sexual politics, women's roles in society, and the ways in which women's personal lives reflect larger power structures.

Since the 1970s, scholars of women's studies have taken post-modern approaches to understand gender and its intersections with race, class, ethnicity, sexuality, religion, age, and (dis)ability to produce and maintain power structures within society. With this turn, there has been a focus on language, subjectivity, and social hegemony, and how the lives of subjects, however they identify, are constituted. At the core of these theories is the notion that however one identifies, gender, sex, and sexuality are not intrinsic, but are socially constructed.

Major theories employed in women's studies courses include feminist theory, intersectionality, standpoint theory, transnational feminism, and social justice. Research practices associated with women's studies place women and the experiences of women at the center of inquiry through the use of quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods. Feminist researchers acknowledge their role in the production of knowledge and make explicit the relationship between the researcher and the research subject.

Feminist theory

Feminist theory refers to the body of writing that works to address gender discrimination and disparities, while acknowledging, describing, and analyzing the experiences and conditions of women's lives. Theorists and writers such as bell hooks, Simone de Beauvoir, Patricia Hill Collins, and Alice Walker added to the field of feminist theory with respect to the ways in which race and gender mutually inform the experiences of women of color with works such as Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (hooks), In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens (Walker), and Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment (Collins). Alice Walker coined the term womanism to situate black women's experiences as they struggle for social change and liberation, while simultaneously celebrating the strength of black women, their culture, and their beauty. Patricia Hill Collin's contributed the concept of the "matrix of domination" to feminist theory, which reconceptualized race, class, and gender as interlocking systems of oppression that shape experiences of privilege and oppression.

Woman in Women's Studies area of the library

Intersectionality

Intersectionality is a way of understanding and analyzing the complexity in people, human experiences, and society. Associated with the third wave of feminism, Kimberlé Crenshaw's theory of intersectionality has become the key theoretical framework through which various feminist scholars discuss the relationship of between one's social and political identities such as gender, race, age, and sexual orientation, and received societal discrimination. Intersectionality posits that these relationships must be considered to understand hierarchies of power and privilege, as well as the effects in which they manifest in an individual's life. Though events and conditions of social and political life are often thought to be shaped by one factor, intersectionality theorizes that oppression and social inequality are a result of how powerful individuals view the combination of various factors; emphasizing that discrimination is accounted for by power, not personal identity.

Standpoint theory

Standpoint theory, also classified as feminist standpoint theory, developed in the 1980s as a way of critically examining the production of knowledge and its resulting effects on practices of power. Standpoint theory operates from the idea that knowledge is socially situated and underrepresented groups and minorities have historically been ignored or marginalized when it comes to the production of knowledge. Emerging from Marxist thought, standpoint theory argues for analysis that challenges the authority of political and social "truths". Standpoint theory, assumes that power lies solely within the hands of the male gender as the process of decision making in society is constructed exclusively for, and by men. An example of where standpoint theory presents itself in society is through the processes of political analysis, as this field of study is almost entirely controlled by men. Furthermore, from a Marxist viewpoint, Karl Marx had expressed a notion in which believed that those in power have the inability to understand the perspectives of those whom they hold power. Providing that standpoint theory acknowledges the male incapability of understanding the oppression in which women face in society.

Transnational feminist theory

Transnational feminism is concerned with the flow of social, political, and economic equality of women and men across borders; directly in response to globalization, neoliberalism, and imperialism. Women's studies began incorporating transnational feminist theory into its curricula as a way to disrupt and challenge the ways in which knowledge regarding gender is prioritized, transmitted, and circulated in the field and academy. Transnational feminist theory is continually challenging the traditional divides of society, in which are crucial to ongoing politics and cultural beliefs. A key recognition advanced from the transnational feminist perspective is that gender is, has been, and will continue to be, a global effort. Furthermore, a transnational feminist perspective perpetuates that a lack of attention to the cultural and economic injustices of gender, as a result of globalization, may aid in the reinforcing of global gender inequalities; though, this can only come about when one occupies globally privileged subject positions.

Social justice

Since its inception and connection with the women's movement, activism has been a foundation of women's studies. Increasingly social justice has become a key component of women's studies courses, programs, and departments. Social justice theory is concerned with the fight for just communities, not on the individual level, but for the whole of society. Women's studies students engage in social justice projects, although some scholars and critics are concerned about requiring students to engage in both mandated activism and/or social justice work. Women's studies not only focus on concepts such as domestic violence, discrimination in the workplace, and gender differences in the division of labor at home, but gives a foundation for understanding the root cause of these concepts, which is the first step to making for a better life for women.

Agency

Agency may be defined as the capability to make choices individually and freely. An individual's agency may be restricted due to various social factors, such as gender, race, religion and social class. From a feminist standpoint, agency may be viewed as an attempt to equalize the one-sided oppression that has characterized first wave feminism. Feminists use agency in attempt to create new forms of autonomy and dependence from the reshaping of gender relations that is taking place in global society. Women's studies acknowledges the lack of agency in which women historically possessed, due to hierarchical positions in society. Feminists are actively making an effort to increase gender equality, as it may result in expanding social agency for all women.

Materialism

Materialist theory derives from 1960s and 1970s social work in feminism. Materialism possesses significant ties to the Marxist theories of history, agency, and ideology; though, may be distinguished through the incorporation of language and culture to its philosophy. Materialism poses questions to both social analytics and social relations, in which may be found in the material conditions of any given society. In addition from examining from a gender standpoint, material conditions are studied in relation to realistic aspects of women's lives. A key aspect in which materialist feminists have revealed these relations is from the feminist perspective, claiming that social conditions of gender are historically situated, as well as subjected to intervention and change. Materialist feminism specifically focuses on social arrangements that accentuate the role of women notably the aspects of family, domesticity, and motherhood. Materialism analyzes gendering discourses in which promote women's marginalization; Thus, one of the most influential aspects of materialist feminism is its attentiveness with questions of ideology and how they relate to history and agency.

Pedagogies

In most institutions, women's studies courses employ feminist pedagogy in a triad model of equal parts research, theory, and praxis. The decentralization of the professor as the source of knowledge is often fundamental to women's studies classroom culture. Students are encouraged to take an active role in "claiming" their education, taking responsibility for themselves and the learning process. Women's studies programs and courses are designed to explore the intersectionality of gender, race, sexuality, class and other topics that are involved in identity politics and societal norms through a feminist lens. Women's studies courses focus on a variety of topics such as media literacy, sexuality, race and ethnicity, history involving women, queer theory, multiculturalism and other courses closely related. Faculty incorporate these components into classes across a variety of topics, including popular culture, women in the economy, reproductive and environmental justice, and women's health across the lifespan.

Women's studies programs are involved in social justice work and often design curricula that are embedded with theory and activism outside of the classroom setting. Some women's studies programs offer internships that are community-based allowing students the opportunity to experience how institutional structures of privilege and oppression directly affects women's lives. Women's studies curricula often encourage students to participate in service-learning activities in addition to discussion and reflection upon course materials. However, Daphne Patai, from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, has criticized this aspect of women's studies programs, arguing that they place politics over education, stating "the strategies of faculty members in these programs have included policing insensitive language, championing research methods deemed congenial to women (such as qualitative over quantitative methods), and conducting classes as if they were therapy sessions." Since women's studies students analyze identity markers including gender, race, class, and sexuality, this often results in dissecting institutionalized structures of power. As a result of these pedagogies, women's studies students leave university with a tool set to make social change and do something about power inequalities in society.

Notable women's studies scholars include Charlotte Bunch, Patricia Hill Collins, bell hooks, Angela Davis, Cherríe Moraga, Audre Lorde, Adrienne Rich, and Barbara Ransby.

Internal academic criticism

In the book Professing Feminism: Education and Indoctrination in Women's Studies, thirty Women's Studies academics came together to criticise the "unhealthy conditions and self-destructive tendencies that appear to be intrinsic to many Women's Studies programs". Professors spoke of being unable to "discuss their concerns about this belligerent anti-intellectualism with other faculty members in Women's Studies", with claims of a "constant emphasis on political purity.... from both students and professors".

See also

Notes

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  5. Berger, Michele Tracy; Radeloff, Cheryl (2015). Transforming Scholarship: Why Women's and Gender Studies Students Are Changing Themselves and the World. New York: Routledge. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-415-83653-1.
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  7. Atrobus, Peggy; Wendy Harcourt (2015). "DAWN, the Third World Feminist Network: Upturning Hierarchies". In Rawwida Baksh-Soodeen (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Transnational Feminist Movements. Oxford University Press. pp. 159–187. ISBN 978-0-19-994349-4.
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References

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