Monash University Handbook 2011 Postgraduate - Area of Study

Women's and gender studies is an exciting interdisciplinary field of study offering feminist perspectives on gender, sexuality and culture. The study programs provide graduates with a broad knowledge of, and a familiarity with, a wide range of feminist and social and cultural theories and methodologies of gender. The postgraduate programs seek to bring innovative theory and research techniques to the study of women's lives, their status in society, and the dilemmas and contradictions surrounding gender identity, power relations and sexualities. In this way, women's studies attempts to correct the absence of material on women and gender relations that for a long time characterised more traditional areas of study. Women's and gender studies also emphasises the diversity of women's experience and the different cultural and historical forms of gendered and sexual embodiment and experience. Beyond general considerations of the changing status of women and where dominant ideas and assumptions about gender and sexual difference come from, women's and gender studies therefore also covers broader issues of:

• how different cultures shape gender identities and sexualities
• how questions of sex or gender relate to questions of class, ethnicity, race, nation, sexuality, religion, ability and age
• how women and gender are represented in film, literature and the media
• shifting cultural and historical modes of femininity and masculinity and transgender
• the role of women and gender in important political, economic, sociological and philosophical debates.

Supervisory expertise is offered in:

• feminist literary, historical and cultural studies
• feminist pedagogy
• film, visual culture, popular culture and performance
• gender and crime
• gender and cultural difference
• gender studies
• medicine, birth and motherhood
• postcolonialism and indigeneity
• sexuality studies
• transgender, feminist and queer theory.

Postgraduate Diploma in Arts (Research)

Students complete 48 points including a 24-point core research unit, a core

coursework unit and one elective unit.

Core units

• APG4284 Gender, sexuality, power
• APG4819 Women's studies research component, or APG4820 Women's studies research component part 1 and APG4821 Women's studies research component part 2

Elective units

• one unit as approved by the course coordinator

Part-time students will be required to complete APG4284 and an elective level-four unit in the first year and units APG4820 and APG4821 in the second year of the program.

Course coordinator

Dr JaneMaree Maher

Master of Arts by Research and Coursework

The entry below only details the coursework component of this degree. For all requirements including the research/thesis component refer to the full course entry at http://www.monash.edu.au/pubs/2011handbooks/courses/2846.html.

This program is recommended for candidates who may not have a strong academic background in feminist theory and gender issues or who are returning to study after a break and would benefit from undertaking coursework units to enhance their understanding of the field.

Units

• APG5284 Gender, sexuality, power*
• an additional approved level five unit to the value of 12 points

* Unless completed at level four in which case another approved level five unit will be selected.

Course coordinator

Dr JaneMaree Maher

Further courses

For a list of units studied or course outlines, refer to the relevant courses.

• 3937 Postgraduate Diploma in Arts (Research)
• 2846 Master of Arts by research and coursework
• 2695 Master of Arts *
• 0020 Doctor of Philosophy*

* By research.