Ursinus Gender, Women's, and Sexuality Studies

Check out the free livestream of two Angela Carter radio plays--each with its own feminist twist! The radio plays run through Sunday.

Main Stage Main Stage Without an opportunity to perform on stage in front of audiences this fall, Ursinus College theater and dance artists are bringing radio plays and dance concerts to life virtually. All performances and behind-the-scenes content will be available for viewing here.  Mark your calendars for...

The Virus Moved Female Faculty to the Brink. Will Universities Help? The pandemic is a new setback for women in academia who already faced obstacles on the path to advancing their research and careers.

Judith Butler on the culture wars, JK Rowling and living in “anti-intellectual times” Thirty years ago, the philosopher Judith Butler*, now 64, published a book that revolutionised popular attitudes on gender. Gender Trouble, the work she is perhaps best known for, introduced ideas of gender as performance. It asked how we define “the category of women” and, as a consequence, who...

Faculty research spotlight! Associate Professor of History and GWSS faculty member Dr. Edward Onaci recently published an exciting new book, Free the Land: The Republic of New Afrika and the Pursuit of a Black Nation-State, available now from UNC Press. Check it out - as well as his many stellar GWSS courses, including perennial student favorite Women's Activist Auto/Biographies!

GWSS at Ursinus is more active on Instagram than here on FB these days, so please follow us for more spotlights on GWSS faculty, students, classes, and endless reading recommendations!

Dr. Meghan Brodie will be teaching “Butches, Bi***es, & Buggers: Modern Q***r Drama” again in Spring 2021. (The class begins with Esther Newton’s essay “The Misunderstanding: Toward a More Precise Sexual Vocabulary”—Esther should definitely be in the photo). Dr. Brodie plans to add this NY Times piece to the syllabus as a conversation starter about butch visibility in an era in which the distinctions between le***an butch identities and q***r transmasculine identities seem to be predicated on the plasticity (or perceived lack thereof) and politics of the term “woman” and its concomitant identities. Check out the article below.

The Butches and Studs Who’ve Defied the Male Gaze and Redefined Culture Without their presence and contributions, q***r aesthetics — and the arts at large — would be far less rich.

Opinion | The Forgotten Origins of Paid Family Leave In 1919, activists from around the world pressed governments to adopt policies to help working mothers.

Livestream of first public impeachment hearings happening all day in Olin 104. All members of the College community are welcome. Come on through! There will be pizza + snacks.

especially relevant for current GWSS-200 students...

Think Gender Is Performance? You Have Judith Butler to Thank for That. The radical theorist who spawned a gender-q***r nation — and became a pop celebrity in the process.

"The Society for Cutting Up Men is a rather fabulous name for a tr*******al book club."

Check out this 2017 n+1 essay from our speaker this coming Thursday (4/11), Andrea Long Chu

On Liking Women

"What might I have experienced if I had not been trying to claw my way toward beauty? What things might I have thought, feelings might I have felt, if that space were freed up inside of myself?

What would it have been like to pass that mirror in my hometown, and to see myself — on the way to the library, or a party with friends, or a walk in the park — and simply feel glad that I was able to do those things, that I have a body that allows me to? What would it have been like not to look at it at all?"

Opinion | Why Do We All Have to Be Beautiful? The message of inclusivity is meant to be helpful, but it can actually do harm.

Opinion | The Thrill of a Women’s Wave Watching anti-Trump female candidates win is exciting, but I’m worried about all they’re being asked to do.

The Coming of Age of Trans-Lit Transgender writers are embracing a more elastic literary form — the novel — and a number of recent works, often genre-bending as well as gender-bending, have won critical acclaim.