What's new in Women's and Gender Studies?
What is Women's and Gender Studies?
Women's and Gender Studies is an interdisciplinary field of scholarship devoted to the study of women and gender in different cultures and time periods.
Women's and Gender Studies emerged in response to the recognition that the academic disciplines have studied human life by investigating men's lives. A primary aim of Women's and Gender Studies is to include women in our body of knowledge by examining women's writings, by researching women's roles and status in various societies, and by emphasizing women's cultural and historic contributions.
Women's and Gender Studies stresses the gendered nature of human life. It is also sensitive to other fundamental differences among humans, including differences of class, race, ethnicity, age, and sexual orientation. Taking such differences into account offers us new ways of thinking about history, literature, culture, art, philosophy, science, and other academic disciplines.
The Women's and Gender Studies Program at the College of Charleston offers an interdisciplinary minor to students who wish to explore issues of gender more fully in their academic course of study. The program also sponsors a variety of speakers, films, and activities during the year and advises a student organization, CofC NOW.