Women's studies

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Women's studies (also known as Feminist studies) is an interdisciplinary academic field devoted to topics concerning women, feminism, gender, and politics. It often includes feminist theory, women's history (e.g. a history of women's suffrage) and social history, women's fiction, women's health, feminist psychoanalysis and the feminist and gender studies-influenced practice of most of the humanities and social sciences.

1 History
2 Curriculum and methodology
3 See also
4 References
5 Further reading
6 External links

History

Women's studies was first conceived as an academic rubric apart from other departments in the late 1960s, as the second wave of feminism gained political influence in the academy through student and faculty activism. As an academic discipline, it was modeled on the American studies and ethnic studies (such as Afro-American studies) and Chicano Studies programs that had arisen shortly before it. The first Women's Studies Program in the United States was established on May 21, 1970 at San Diego State College (now San Diego State University) after a year of intense organizing of women's consciousness raising groups, rallies, petition circulating, and operating unofficial or experimental classes and presentations before seven committees and assemblies.^[1] Carol Rowell Council was the student co-founder along with Dr. Joyce Nower, a literature instructor. A second program followed within weeks at Richmond College of the City University of New York (now the College of Staten Island). In the 1970s many universities and colleges created departments and programs in women's studies, and professorships became available in the field which did not require the sponsorship of other departments.

By the late twentieth century, women's studies courses were available at many universities and colleges around the world. One source identified 395 separate programs in the United States.^[2] Courses in the United Kingdom can be found through the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service.^[3]

Curriculum and methodology

Many universities that offer degrees in Women’s Studies also offer related classes in topics such as gender studies, women and religion, female sexuality, sex crimes, and gay/lesbian studies.^[4]

Critics of the modern-day women's movement have extended their criticisms to the discipline of women's studies. Writers including Camille Paglia, Christina Hoff-Sommers, Phyllis Chesler, and Karen Lerhman have critiqued scholarship standards within women's studies programs.^[5] Researchers Daphne Patai and Noretta Koertge argue that many women's studies departments in the United States espouse a type of feminism that rests on a "totalizing world view".^[6]^[7]