Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies (WGSS)

This course explores non-fiction literature for children and adolescents that promotes critical consciousness, cultural competency, and social justice. Students will engage with texts that challenge dominant narratives about world events and cultures and provide alternative perspectives. Through reading, discussion, and reflection, students will develop an understanding of the importance of representation in children's literature and its impact on young readers' sense of self and the world around them. The course will also emphasize the role of educators in creating inclusive learning environments and promoting social justice through literature.

This writing intensive course will examine issues of gender and sexuality in the Bible, including the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, the Deuterocanon, and the New Testament. It will introduce students to a variety of academic approaches to the Bible with respect to a broad range of topics. These topics include: gender identity, sexual orientation, sex, marriage and divorce, adultery, monogamy and polygyny, same-sex relations, chastity and celibacy, prostitution, gender violence, pornography, fertility, procreation, abortion, divine gender and sex, incest, and many others. In covering these themes, the course will deal with some of the most challenging and often disturbing stories and passages in the Bible, the ancient library of books that is sacred to Jews and Christians and which has otherwise greatly influenced civilization for more-or-less two thousand years. Alongside a close reading of the text (philology), this course will employ historical and literary criticism, investigations into ancient material culture (archaeology), modern theoretical interpretive approaches, reception theory, and other methodologies to examine not only the biblical writings in their ancient contexts, but their interpretation and use throughout history to construct social norms.