Feminist Theory
SOCY 5036, Spring 2005
Professor AnnJanette Rosga Class Time/Day: F 3:00-6:00pm
Office: 219 Ketchum Hall Classroom: Ketchum 33
Phone: 735-2389, email: rosga@colorado.edu
Office Hours: Fridays 2:00-3:00, or by appt.
[T]o admit the importance of theory is to make an open-ended commitment,
to leave yourself in a position where there are always important things you donÕt know.
ÉTheory makes you desire mastery É[but]Émakes mastery impossible.
There are no new ideas. There are only new ways of making them felt.
Audre Lorde
Course Description & Requirements
Depending on how one slices it, Òfeminist theoryÓ can span decades (if not centuries), disciplines, genres, agendas, languages, cultures, geographies and topical foci. Possible organizational schemas for a graduate seminar on this material proliferate wildly. Rather than attempting a representative sampling or making any pretense to comprehensiveness, this course will focus primarily on feminist theories that are generally categorized as Òpoststructuralist,Ó and will endeavor to ensure that students acquire sufficient vocabulary and familiarity with key texts to understand and work with these theories.[1] Among other things, this means that the course will prioritize a reckoning with the epistemological ramifications of poststructuralist feminist theory: how do writings that fall within this loosely bounded arena impact the kinds of questions we might ask in social research? What ÒmovesÓ do they enable us to make in our study of social phenomena? What are the assumptions made by these theories and how might they affect what we think we know about the social world, how we ÒknowÓ it, and what any of us think weÕre up to when we set out to ÒstudyÓ it?
The first half of the term will be spent reviewing the necessary corollary concepts to any study of poststructuralist feminist theory (e.g. structuralism, semiotics, psychoanalysis, subjectivity, discourse, language, power/knowledge). This material will be covered primarily in lecture-discussion format, while the readings assigned will each draw upon and make use of specific key concepts.
During the second half of the term, weÕll set out to explore specific applications of feminist poststructuralist theory. The course will focus particularly on the ramifications of these theories Ð theories that arise out of, and analyze, the experience of living in and through the mediations of ÒmarkedÓ categories (woman, queer, [post]colonial) Ð for the study of lives lived in/through/via ÒunmarkedÓ experiences and institutions. Put another way, the course will ask: of what use are poststructuralist feminist, queer, and/or postcolonial theories for the analysis of topics that are not primarily identified in terms of their connection to ÒoppressedÓ groups? To this end, we will examine feminist theories of masculinity, heteronormativity, ÒwhiteÓ-ness, the state, nation and empire.
Writing & Presentation Requirements
Papers
Approximately half of the credit for this course is to be earned via traditional analytical writing assignments. This requirement may be fulfilled in one of two ways. Option one is to write a full-length (15-25pp.) seminar paper on a particular topic of interest, using the theoretical material covered in this class. The second option is to write 3 shorter (5-7pp.) reading-response essays, each considering (and placing into conversation) the writings of 2-5 different authors.
In order to facilitate our understanding of material that is often highly abstract, the remaining two assignments are designed to concretize, to encourage you to directly apply, and to facilitate our discussions of theoretical texts:
Applications
Each student will be required to prepare one 10-15minute presentation for the class in which she or he describes an application of one or more particular theoretical texts to a topic or issue that is apparently unrelated to the topics taken up by the text(s). (For example, one might apply Donna HarawayÕs analysis of technoscience to a legal practice or institution, or Chandra MohantyÕs discussion of the Òwestern gazeÓ to biomedical imaging procedures.) This assignment will likely be most useful to you if you can apply a given theoretical text(s) to a topic of particular interest to you (e.g. your dissertation research topic, or a topic youÕre considering for your dissertation). The goal of your presentation should be not simply to summarize, or to illustrate your grasp of, the theory under discussion, but to extend our understanding of that theory by showing how it affects your consideration of a seemingly unrelated topic.
Engagements
Theoretical texts are, of course, written by real live people. This assignment asks you to go out and find the authors whose work weÕll be reading and interview them about that work. You may carry out this assignment individually or in a group with one or two other students. You may conduct the interview in any way you see fit (for example, you might focus entirely on the work weÕre reading, asking the author about her or his thoughts on that piece now that some time has passed since it was written; you might ask the author to trace her or his intellectual influences; you might ask her or him about how s/he writes and to what end? Or, you might interview two or more co-authors about their work together). YouÕll then present the findings of your interview to the class in another 10-15 minute presentation. The goal of this assignment is similarly to bring another dimension of an authorÕs work into our discussions so that we might all more richly understand that work.[2]
Paper deadlines are for you, for the smooth functioning of the class, and to help me keep a sane grading schedule. If you require a paper extension for any reason, please inform me, at least one week prior to the class meeting in which the assignment is due, of the alternative deadline you intend to meet. For your own and othersÕ sakes, please make every effort to meet original deadlines.
Presentation deadlines are vital to meet, since the entire class will be counting on your contribution in order to fully engage with the dayÕs assigned reading material. If you determine that you will be unable to make a presentation for which you have signed up, you are fully responsible for locating another student(s) to take your place, and for ensuring that the interview or applications material will be covered by your replacement.
Attendance & Discussion Requirements
Attendance at all seminar meetings is mandatory. The course is designed as an intensive reading and discussion workshop; your active, well-prepared, participation is essential to its success. Should circumstances require you to miss a meeting, however, you are responsible for ensuring that your writing assignments are delivered to me on time, that you are informed of the material missed in class, and that any obligations you have to the class or other students are fulfilled or rearranged. Each absence will result in a 2% reduction in your overall grade. More than two absences will result in your failing the class.
Whenever possible, I encourage you to work with one or more of your fellow students in preparing to discuss assigned readings in class. An extra eye helps ensure youÕve identified the salient points of a given text and often helps you to formulate excellent questions about the reading.
If you have specific physical, psychiatric, or learning disabilities and require accommodations, please let me know early in the semester so that your learning needs may be appropriately met. You will need to provide documentation of your disability to the Disability Services Office in Willard 322 (phone 303-492-8671).
|
Application |
15% |
|
Interview |
20% |
|
3 short essays @ 15% each OR 1 final seminar paper |
45% |
|
Participation |
20% |
|
Total |
100% |
|
Abbrev. in Schedule |
Text |
|
|
Denise Riley, Am I That Name? University of Minnesota Press, 1989 |
|
Haraway |
Donna Haraway, The Haraway Reader, Routledge, 2003 (ÒHarawayÓ in schedule). |
|
M&K |
Carole R. McCann and Seung-Kyung Kim, Feminist Theory Reader: Local and Global Perspectives, Routledge, 2002 (ÒM&KÓ in schedule). |
|
JKG |
Judith Kegan Gardiner, Masculinity Studies and Feminist Theory, Columbia University Press, 2002 (ÒJKGÓ in schedule). |
|
Conboy |
Katie Conboy, Nadia Medina and Sarah Stranbury, eds. Writing on the Body: Female Embodiment and Feminist Theory. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997. |
|
Fine |
Michelle Fine, et. al., eds. Off White: Readings on Race, Power and Society. New York: Routledge, 1997. |
|
McClintock |
Anne McClintock, Aamir Mufti and Ella Shohat, eds. Dangerous Liaisons. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997. |
|
|
Foucault, Michel. The History of Sexuality: An Introduction, Vol.1. New York: Vintage Books, 1978. |
|
|
Bornstein, Kate. Gender Outlaw. New York: Vintage Books, 1994. |
|
[R] |
Additional readings on Norlin E-Reserve |
Part 1: Key Concepts
Introduction to the class and to one another.
January 21: Structuralism and Semiotics
Professor Rosga away Ð class-led discussion
Guest: Professor Donna Haraway
First Short Essay Due
[March 1: Angela Davis speaking @ Mackey]
[March 9: Kate Bornstein speaking]
Spring break, no class
Part Two: Diffractions
What we need is to make a difference in material-semiotic apparatuses, to diffract the rays of technoscience so that we get more promising interference patterns on the recording films of our lives and bodies. Diffraction is an optical metaphor for the effort to make a difference in the world.
ÉThe point is to learn to remember that we might have been otherwise,
and might yet be, as a matter of embodied fact.
Donna Haraway
Second Short Essay Due
May 2, 5pm
Third Short Essay or Final Seminar Paper Due
[1] One of the required texts, however, Feminist Theory Reader: Local and Global Perspectives, contains a sampling of early canonical works in feminist theory as well as an excellent sampling of second and third wave Òclassics.Ó This text was selected to provide a resource to students with limited background in first-third wave precursors to, and foundations for, poststructuralist feminist theories.
[2] An exception to the rule that anyone who is living, and whose work is assigned in this class, may be interviewed is Donna Haraway. She will be visiting the class herself, so we may all pose questions to her in person.