WGS 25.     Introduction to Gender & Sexuality. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Critical Thinking (A3)

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer

This course introduces students to basic concepts, terms, and definitions in the study of gender and sexuality from global and interdisciplinary perspectives. It teaches students to critically evaluate how patriarchy and heteronormativity control gender expression and experiences of sexuality. The course will help students develop critical thinking and analytical skills to examine the role of socio-cultural practices, political-economic structures, racial-ethnic hierarchies, or religious beliefs in the social construction of gender and sexuality.

WGS 50.     Introduction to LGBTQ Studies. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer

This course introduces students to the interdisciplinary field of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer studies. Students will engage in the critical study of sexuality and gender as constituted through race, culture, class, age, disability, and nation. The course examines the production of cultural, social, political, and scientific discourses about non-heteronormative sexualities and non-normative genders. Students will learn about LGBTQ+ identities, communities, activism, and political movements in the United States and globally..

WGS 75.     Introduction to Disability Studies. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

This course is an introduction to disability studies. An intersectional approach to knowledge construction about disability will be examined. This interdisciplinary study draws on humanities and social sciences, feminism, medical and scientific literature, and popular sources. How gender, race, class, sexuality, ethnicity, and nationality intersect with disability to shape experience will be analyzed. Historical and contemporary social movements and activism by people with disabilities will also be discussed.

WGS 85.     Introduction to Women's & Gender Studies. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Introduction to major topics and issues within feminism. Using interdisciplinary and intersectional perspectives, the course will examine issues in women's and gender studies across the globe. Feminist methods and approaches will be examined using classic and contemporary texts. Topics include intersectionality, LGBTQ studies, domestic violence, reproductive justice, beauty standards, disability, and globalization.

WGS 110.     Introduction to Feminist Movements in the United States. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D, United States History

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

An examination of the institutional structures, practices and ideals contributing to feminist struggles, and achievements of feminist movements in the United States. Including contemporary struggles for social justice by women and LGBTQ people, this course explores how factors of race, class, gender, and sexuality have contributed to the emergence of feminist consciousness and struggles for rights in the United States from the nineteenth century to the present time.

WGS 118.     Asian American Women. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Humanities (Area C2)

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Using an interdisciplinary approach, course offers a broad introduction to broad principle values and traditions shaping Asian American women's lives in the U.S. Examines cultural diversity, gender inequality and conflicts between traditions and social practices through critical analysis of literature, film and cultural theories as expressions of identity. Topics covered include: cultural heritage and philosophies, intergenerational conflict, transnationalism, gender roles and socio-economic practices. Comprehensive understanding principle factors governing Asian American women's lives at the nexus of Asian and American cultures.

Cross-listed: ETHN 118.

WGS 120.     Mother Woman Person. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D

Term Typically Offered: Fall only

This course applies principles of feminism to the study of motherhood as social institution and private experience. Students explore family, cultural and social values that influenced their mothers and grandmothers, analyzing the impact of social institutions on their own childhood and adulthood. Students develop awareness of the historic evolution of women's social and private roles and the changing emphasis on woman as mother, wife/sexual companion and wage earning person largely through African American women's social movements.

WGS 121.     Women Of The Middle East. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Humanities (Area C2)

Term Typically Offered: Fall only

This course will introduce students to historical and contemporary issues contributing to women¿s and LGBTQ people's experiences in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Topics covered may include the rise of major religions, cultural practices such as veiling and genital cutting, socio-economic transformations, revolutions, and relationships. Confrontations with patriarchal power structures, struggles for identity, and the multiple roles and strategies women and LGBTQ people adopt for survival and empowerment will be examined.

WGS 125.     Sex & Gender in South Asia. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Humanities (Area C2)

Term Typically Offered: Spring, Summer

This course focuses on love, sex & gender in the cultures of South Asia starting with ancient times to the present. The influence of social customs, traditions, religion, and social class on human relationships will be examined using various texts and films. Gender and sexual identity, sexual desire, eroticism, sex role stereotyping, violence against women, gay and transgender people, subversive desires and the threat they post to patriarchal structures will be explored.

WGS 133.     Gender & Health. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Further Studies in Area B (B5), Upper Division Further Studies in Area B5

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

This course explores feminist analyses of medicine. An intersectional approach to how medical science constructs knowledge about health will be examined. This interdisciplinary study draws on humanities and social sciences; feminism; medical, scientific, and clinical literature; popular sources; and web discourses. How gender, race, class, sexuality, ethnicity, nationality, and disability intersect and shape behavior and experience will be analyzed. Contemporary social movements and activism by women and LGBTQIA+ people will also be discussed.

WGS 136.     Gender, Race, and Class.  3 Units

Prerequisite(s): Junior standing; a WPJ Portfolio score OR ENGL 109M or ENGL 109W

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D, Race & Ethnicity Graduation Requirement (RE), Writing Intensive Graduation Requirement (WI)

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Designed to examine the effects of the dynamic interaction of gender, race, and class on women. The social construction of gender, race, and class will also be examined. Other topics to be discussed and researched are the effects of sexism, racism, and classicism on institutions such as academia, business, government, religion, and social movements. Also provides an analysis of effective techniques to end sexism, racism, and classicism.

WGS 137.     Women of Color. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D, Race & Ethnicity Graduation Requirement (RE)

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Winter

This course examines significant issues that have contributed to the historical experiences of cisgender and transgender women of color in the United States. Contemporary resistance to violence and struggles for social justice will also be examined. Topics such as racial and cultural stereotypes, economic exploitation, gender stratification, struggles over identity, immigration status, and community activism and organizing efforts by Black, Native American, Latinx, Middle Eastern and Asian American women will be examined using classic and contemporary feminist readings and films.

WGS 138.     Women and Work. 3 Units

Prerequisite(s): Junior standing; a WPJ Portfolio score OR ENGL 109M or ENGL 109W

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D, Writing Intensive Graduation Requirement (WI)

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Explores topics basic to discussion of women's paid and unpaid work from historical and crosscultural perspectives. Consideration is given to popular conceptions and stereotypes of work and "women's issues" in the industrialized world; the private and public lives of women and men with emphasis on work and social realities; and the maintenance of patriarchy under capitalism, socialism and communism, with some possible feminist "solutions.

WGS 139.     Violence Against Women. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Examines the gendered and systemic nature of violence. Focuses on understanding and preventing violence against women. This course investigates oppression and privilege using an intersectional and transnational feminist lens and looks at how gender-based violence is perpetuated through some of the following: sexual harassment and assault, domestic violence, child abuse, medical and psychiatric violence, economic violence, military violence, and state violence. This course also examines the ways that women are individually and collectively combating these various forms of violence.

WGS 140.     Latinx Feminist Studies. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D, Race & Ethnicity Graduation Requirement (RE)

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

This course offers students feminist frameworks for understanding Latinx feminisms as a field of study and political inquiry. Latinx feminisms and their development are mapped alongside queer, trans, Black, Indigenous, women of color, and antiracist feminisms and movements. Centers the creative and critical ways in which Latinx feminists conceptualize oppression, resistance, social transformation, and the abolition of systems of domination. Students will analyze the complexity, heterogeneity, and interconnectedness of U.S. based Latinx feminists.

WGS 144.     Women and Theatre: Staging Diversity. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Race & Ethnicity Graduation Requirement (RE), Arts (Area C1)

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Includes study of recent feminist performance theory and criticism and its application to acting, directing, and writing for the theatre. Students will participate in both lecture/discussion and activities, including the creation of a final performance. Lecture two hours; lab two hours.

Cross Listed: THEA 144; only one may be counted for credit.

WGS 145.     Goddess, Witch, Feminist. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Humanities (Area C2)

Term Typically Offered: Fall only

This course examines Goddess cultures and the power of feminist spirituality and healing across different cultures and time-periods using Art & Literature. Sexism in institutionalized religions, advances women are making, and the backlashes they are suffering will be discussed. The `witch craze¿ which began in Europe, how women across the world continue to suffer from accusations of witchcraft today will be covered. We will examine aspects of the modern feminist spiritual movement and its strong ties to the environmental movements.

WGS 146.     Women In Art. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Arts (Area C1)

Term Typically Offered: Spring only

Study of the unique and important contributions of women to the visual arts (Renaissance to present) and their personal struggle toward success and recognition. The Women's Art Movement and its impact on education, museums and women's status in the arts are important topics of this class.

WGS 147.     Women & Globalization. 3 Units

Prerequisite(s): Minimum 45 units completed

Term Typically Offered: Fall only

This advanced interdisciplinary course will explore the gendered effects of globalization across the world at local, national, and global scales. Using feminist approaches, the course will examine issues of gender equity and uneven distribution of power created by the interconnection between capitalism, colonialism, and patriarchy. Topics such as economic globalization, war and militarism, tourism, sex trafficking, food security and environmental justice, gender-based violence, healthcare, migration and global activism will be covered in the course.

WGS 148.     Black Feminisms. 3 Units

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: GE AREA D

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

This course offers students frameworks for understanding Black feminisms as a field of study and political inquiry. Black feminisms highlight the intersections of race and gender oppression while interrogating capitalism, homophobia and transphobia, xenophobia, ableism, and other forms of suppression. This class will cover how Black feminists critically respond to issues of systemic discrimination in areas such as education, policing, and pop culture. Students will use Black feminist texts to interrogate interlocking systems of domination within the United States.

WGS 150.     Introduction to Queer and Trans Studies. 3 Units

Prerequisite(s): WGS 50 or instructor permission.

Term Typically Offered: Fall only

Introduces students to the fields of queer theory and trans theory from a transnational feminist perspective. Includes theoretical approaches to the history of sexuality and the politics of sexual and gender normativity. Places queer and trans studies in conversation with Native studies, dis/ability studies, postcolonial theory, critical race and ethnic studies, and feminist theory.

WGS 166.     Gender and Politics. 3 Units

Term Typically Offered: Spring only

This course examines the influence of socially constructed meanings of femininity and masculinity on the political participation of women, candidate selection, election campaigns, and electoral outcomes in executive and legislative offices in the U.S. and worldwide. Students will develop a rich understanding of the relationship between gender and women¿s political representation and analyze and discuss institutional, structural, cultural, and historical conditions associated with women's voting behavior, political advancement, leadership styles, and impacts of political representation on women.

Cross Listed: POLS 166; only one may be counted for credit.

WGS 172A.     LGBTQ Histories. 3 Units

Term Typically Offered: Spring only

This course provides an introduction to the study of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) histories. Uses an interdisciplinary and comparative approach to explore the historical emergence and development of LGBTQ identities, communities, and political movements. Includes theoretical analysis of the history of gender and sexuality and the practice of historical analysis.

Cross Listed: HIST 172A; only one may be taken for credit.

WGS 175.     Gender & Disability. 3 Units

Prerequisite(s): Junior standing; a WPJ Portfolio score OR ENGL 109M or ENGL 109W

General Education Area/Graduation Requirement: Writing Intensive Graduation Requirement (WI), GE AREA D

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

This interdisciplinary course utilizes texts from various humanities and social sciences disciplines to survey the field of feminist disability studies, with emphasis on intersectional feminist disability theory, narrative, and practice. Attention will be given to historical and contemporary social movements and activism by disabled people, focusing particularly on disability justice. Students will analyze how individual experiences of gender, race, class, sexuality, ethnicity, and nationality intersect with disability to reflect institutional bias against multiply marginalized disabled people.

WGS 180.     Seminar in Feminist Theory. 3 Units

Prerequisite(s): WGS 139, WGS 147, WGS 150, or WGS 175

Term Typically Offered: Spring only

Advanced course providing detailed inquiry into specific feminist theories, including their conceptual framework and development, relationship to other political theories and application to the current practices of feminism.

WGS 195A.     Fieldwork in Women's Studies. 1 - 3 Units

Prerequisite(s): Instructor permission.

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Supervised experience in selected women's organizations and projects in the Sacramento area; for example, the Rape Crisis Center, Women Escaping a Violent Environment (WEAVE), Sacramento Women's Center.

Credit/No Credit

WGS 198.     Special Topics in Women's and Gender Studies. 3 Units

Prerequisite(s): WGS 85 or WGS 110

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Examines various topics within the field of women's and gender studies. Different issues will be covered based on the interests and expertise of the faculty teaching the course. Approaches topics from broadly intersectional perspectives using feminist concepts and methods. Potential topics include: Feminism & War; Queer & Trans Migrations; Gender, Sexuality & Mass Incarceration; Gender & Human Rights; Reproductive Justice; Feminist Disability Studies; LGBTQ Health; Black Motherhood; Black Feminist Activism; Gender & Education; Comparative Feminisms.

WGS 199.     Special Problems. 1 - 3 Units

Prerequisite(s): WGS 115 and instructor permission.

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Supervised individual research projects or directed reading specifically related to Women's Studies topics. Should be taken by students who can work on an individual basis.

Credit/No Credit

WGS 299.     Special Research Problems. 1 - 3 Units

Term Typically Offered: Fall, Spring

Supervised research projects and directed study specifically related to Women's Studies and taken on an individual basis by Graduate students in the Special Major Graduate Program.

Credit/No Credit