WGS Tentative Courses for Fall 2026

WGS 2100 Intro to Gender & Sexuality Studies

Corinne Field

An introduction to gender and LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer) studies, including the fields of women’s studies, feminist studies, & masculinity studies. Students will examine historical movements, theoretical issues, & contemporary debates, especially as they pertain to issues of inequality & to the intersection of gender, race, class, sexuality, & nationalism. Emphasis will vary according to the interdisciplinary expertise & research focus of the instructor.

Special Note: Required for all WGS majors and minors, Intro courses do not count toward concentrations.

WGS 2110 Feminist Science Studies

Sarah Orsak

We often see scientific claims as objective and the pinnacle of real knowledge; this has given them incredible power to shape how we understand our identities and how we imagine social transformation. Because science has this cachet, it has also been used to make oppression seem natural and thus inevitable—think of the role of race science in supporting colonialism and slavery. For these reasons, feminist and queer thinkers have spent many decades grappling with science and imagining new, feminist, sciences as part of the vibrant interdisciplinary subfield of Feminist Science and Technology Studies (FSTS).
 

WGS 2410/ENWR 2510 FYW Course: Dangerous Bodies: Obscenity, Sex, and Censorship

Sarah Orsak

What distinguishes the artistic or educational from the pornographic? This course asks how ideas of obscenity have been constructed, focusing on gender, race, and sexuality. Alongside feminist and queer scholarship, readings include personal essays, historical documents, news articles, and documentaries. We will address how ideas of obscenity shape issues including internet censorship, reproductive healthcare, and histories of feminism.

WGS 2600 Human Sexualities

Lisa Speidel

Examines human sexuality from psychological, biological, behavioral, social, and historical perspectives. Topics include sexual research and theoretical perspectives, sexual anatomy and physiology, sexual health, intimacy, communication, patterns of sexual response and pleasure and sexual problems and therapies. Course will also include examination of the development of sexuality and the intersections of other identities, gender identity, sexual orientation, sexuality and the law, sexual assault, and other social issues in sexuality.

WGS 2650 Streaming Sexualities

Lisa Speidel and Andre Cavalcante

This course will examine the portrayal of sex and sexuality in a variety of shows on television streaming platforms through the lens of media studies and intersectional, feminist and queer theory. The analysis will address the ideologies, narratives, values and ethics the shows impart. Topics include: the interdisciplinary meaning and representation of sexual orientation, queerness, sexual health, sexual harm, and notions of joy and pleasure.

WGS 3125 Transnational/Global

I.F. Gonzales

This course places women, feminism, and activism in a transnational perspective, and offers students the opportunity to examine how issues considered critical to the field of gender studies are impacting women's lives globally in contemporary national contexts. We will look closely at how violence, economic marginality, intersections of race and gender, and varied strategies for development are affecting women in specific geographical locations.

WGS 3150 Gender, Race, and Power

Tiffany King

Offers a study of race-racialization in relation to gender-sexuality. Consider how the concept of race shapes relationships between gendered selfhood & society, how it informs identity & experiences of the erotic, & how racialized gender & sexuality are created-maintained-monitored. With an interdisciplinary perspective, we will consider how race & power are reproduced & resisted through gender & sexuality, individually-national-international.

WGS 3500 Issues and Controversies in Women's Sport

Bonnie Hagerman

This course develops fundamental skills for critical thinking, researching, writing, and communicating in WGS. Students will learn methods for finding and analyzing sources, approaches to framing arguments, and skills for effective written and oral communication.  Seminars are offered on a variety of topics. This Writing Enhanced Course fulfills the Second Writing Requirement in the college.

WGS 3500 Queer American History

Doug Meyer

This course focuses on the history of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) activism in the United States.  Particular attention will be paid to the twentieth century, but topics covered will include the formation of heterosexual and homosexual identities and the construction of sexual practices prior to the 1900s.  From the twentieth century, the course will focus on the Homophile Movement, Gay Liberation, and ACT UP, among other leftist activist movements.  Although primary emphasis will be placed on historical LGBTQ activism, contemporary movements and politics regarding LGBTQ-rights will also occasionally be a focus of this course.

We will move in chronological order throughout the semester, beginning with the construction of heterosexual and homosexual identities at the end of the 1800s.  Most of the course will then focus on sexual minorities in the early 1900s, prior to World War II, and the discrimination and activism following World War II – that is, the Homophile Movement and Gay Liberation (the period from approximately 1945 through the late 1970s).  We will focus on the Stonewall uprising (1969), at the same time that we critique its place in history.  The course will end with several classes and readings on HIV/AIDS activism during the 1980s, as well as LGBTQ politics in the 1990s.  

This course develops fundamental skills for critical thinking, researching, writing, and communicating in WGS. Students will learn methods for finding and analyzing sources, approaches to framing arguments, and skills for effective written and oral communication. Seminars are offered on a variety of topics. This class fulfills the Second Writing Requirement and Enhanced Writing Requirement. 

Course Category: Second Writing Requirement

WGS 3559 Bisexuality Beyond the Binaries

Lisa Speidel

Bisexuality is regularly misrepresented, misunderstood, or simply not included in sexuality discourse even though bisexual identities total over 52% of the LGB community. This course explores the impact of bisexual erasure, biphobia, and monosexism and moves beyond the typical scholarship focused only on white, cisgender, young, and able-bodied people. An intersectional framework will be used to also examine the complexities of binaries, the significance of the multi-attraction spectrum, and the various forms of resilience, resistance and joy in the Bi+ community.

WGS 3559 Gender and Health

Lanice Avery

Gender and other forms of social stratification shape population health. Students will critically examine biomedical frameworks to consider how structural power influences diagnoses, treatment, health behaviors, and access to care. Readings, case studies, films, and discussion explore: how gender shapes experiences of healthcare, how individuals exercise agency within constrained health systems, and how contemporary health policies and practices may shape health/care futures

WGS 3559 Policing Queerness

Doug Meyer

This course focuses on the policing of queer people.  Particular attention will be paid to how police officers target and criminalize LGBTQ people and how legislative efforts in the U.S. have increasingly restricted LGBTQ rights.  Students will also learn about the history of policing queer people.  Although this course will focus primarily on policing that occurs from the police, other contexts will be considered, including the policing that queer people experience in school and family life.     

WGS 3611 Gender and Sexuality in the United States, 1600-1865

Caroline Janney

This course investigates the significance of gender and sexuality in North America from the first European settlements to the Civil War. We will ask how Indigenous, European, and African understandings of gender and sexuality changed over time. We will pay particular attention to shifting class distinctions and regional differences. 

This course fulfills the second writing requirement, the historical perspectives requirement, and is low-cost.

There are no prerequisites.

WGS 3895 Front Lines of Social Change I

Jaronda Miller-Bryant and Taylor Nichols

Front Lines of Social Change Part 1 (FLSC) is a foundational, interdisciplinary exploration of social justice, and epistemology. This course is designed for students seeking to bridge theory and praxis. We invite you to investigate how your prior knowledge, understandings, and values shape your understanding of the world and how that in turn informs you of your role in creating social change. You will explore the roots of different social issues each week and interrogate how systems of power show up in our everyday lives. You will be challenged to question norms and reflect deeply through texts and in class conversations that go beyond the surface. You will begin to develop your own way of making sense of the world and be prepared to bring that clarity to your internship and beyond.

WGS 4220 Sex and Resistance on the Internet

I.F. Gonzales

As the defining technology of the late-20thand early-21st century, the internet has long been understood as fundamentally shaping the lives of its users, especially with its mainstreaming. The internet has shaped our collective understandings of relating to one another, meeting one another, and, of course, engaging in forms of sex and eroticism with one another. From old-school message boards to modern-day dating apps, from the era of ASCII erotica to OnlyFans, sex and sexuality have been on the internet since its founding. As the memetic Avenue Q line goes: “The internet is for porn.”

All this said, at the same time, attempts to curb certain kinds of eroticism have long followed sexual content online. Fears over sexual content online have led to the implementation of far-reaching pieces of legislation, some of which are still contested today. Moreover, reducing the internet to one thing—be that a seedy avenue to access sexual content or the root of modern social alienation—ignores the robust histories of resistance and resilience performed by digital communities in the everyday. 

This course explores the ways that sexuality, eroticism, and desire have taken shape online, the ways it has been promoted and restricted, and the ways that marginalized groups have used the internet to resist structures of domination of all kinds. We will be utilizing social theory to understand the conditions that shape our daily digital lives, the histories that bring us to where we are today, and how marginalized groups of all kinds work to take sexuality and power into their own hands.

WGS 4500 Topics Course: Gender and Espionage

Bonnie Hagerman

This is a small seminar (not more than 15 students) for WGS majors to pursue advanced study of a particular topic in WGS. Students conceptualize, research, and produce a substantial independent project that demonstrates their competency in the interdisciplinary field of WGS. This course will enable majors to revisit foundational ideas, incorporate what they have learned into their independent research projects, and demonstrate their accumulated skills in critical thinking and communication.

WGS 4820 Black Feminist Theory

Lanice Avery