Week 1
Session 1: Introduction to the course
Week 2
Session 2: How do we think about and experience feminist theory?
Discussion question: How have privilege and discrimination worked in your own life?
Session 3: Tools of feminist theory
Guest speaker: Librarian Jen Greenleaf, MIT Libraries
Thinking assignment: Start thinking about the topic you would like to address in your final paper for this semester. In the first half of class Jen will lead a workshop on identifying a topic and beginning your research.
Week 3
Session 4: Social construction
Guest speaker: Philosophy Professor Sally Haslanger
Post 1–2 discussion questions before class.
Session 5: Keywords
Assignment due: Keyword analysis and topic paragraph. What topic would you like to explore in a research paper (or other presentation) this semester? What preliminary thoughts do you have on how you might go about gathering evidence and on why this topic is important? (Note: The topic paragraph is ungraded, but must be turned in.)
Week 4
Session 6: Sex and gender: What is the work that sex does?
Discussion question: What is the work that sex does?
Session 7: Sexism/Sex oppression
Discussion question: How does the word “oppression” operate as a keyword? Are there differences between how Marilyn Frye, Iris Young and Emi Koyama use the word?
Week 5
Session 8: How to be an antiracist?
Discussion question: What struck you most in Kendi’s How to be an Anti-Racist?
Session 9: The costs of structural racism
Discussion question: Post one paragraph (can be short) on the question or questions you heard most strongly raised in the podcast you listened to. How would you convey her ideas to someone you think might mildly disagree with her?
Week 6
Session 10
Assignment due: Research plan
Week 7
Session 11: Sexuality
Discussion question: Create your own theory of sexuality in 1–2 sentences.
Session 12: Trans*—What’s in a name? What’s in a body?
Discussion question: What is Halberstam trying to do in the first part of the book Trans*: A Quick and Quirky Account of Gender Variability*?*
Week 8
Session 13
Assignment due: Preliminary outline of your paper indicating arguments and evidence.
Session 14: Trans* as a social movement
Week 9
Session 15: Gender and the social construction of the welfare state
Discussion question: Post 1-2 questions before class. What do you find most intriguing about this topic?
Session 16: Militarism and gender
Guest speaker: Carol Cohn
Discussion question: Post 1–2 questions for Carol Cohn
Week 10
Session 17: Twelve Feminist Lessons of War
Guest speaker: Cynthia Enloe
Session 18: Public Event: “Has Feminism Made Progress?” with Mary Harrington and Professor Anne McCants
Week 11
Sessions 19 and 20: Class presentations
Week 12
Session 21
Assignment due: Final research paper
Week 13
Session 22: Embodied knowledge
Session 23: Abortion and criminalization of women
Discussion question: What do you think are the most egregious areas of criminalization of women & non-binary people?
Week 14
Session 24: Pornography
Week 15
Session 25: Native American consciousness and consciousness of the land
Assignment due: Op-ed
