GSS3101

Borderworks: theorising gendered experience

Marion Collis and Mary Griffiths

8 points
* Second semester
* 3 hours per week
* Gippsland and distance
* Prerequisites: Any two of GSC2203, GSC2207, GSC2406, GSC2409, GSC2505 or permission

Objectives On successful completion of this subject students will develop an understanding of gender studies as a distinctive way of reviewing traditional academic disciplines by further developing the analytical skills acquired in previous subjects of the major. Understanding gender as a significant dimension in contemporary issues, and using feminist, malestream and post-structural theoretical frameworks to produce a coherent explanation of gender relations, students will practice an interdisciplinary approach to the framing of knowledge about gendered experience, contribute to the understanding of gender as a collective project, and apply the knowledge gained in the subject to their own lives in a reflexive way.

Synopsis This subject offers students the opportunity to engage with current theoretical shifts around the term `gender'. It presents a series of arguments about the cultural variety of the constructions, social performances and positioning of gendered identities in contemporary multicultural Australia. The emphasis throughout is on developing frameworks for understanding `lived experience' and on paying attention to the relationship between gender and power. Beginning with a consideration of `valid knowledges', the subject offers an historical overview of the project of women's studies, before turning to the explanation and development of the approaches to the relations between women and men proposed in the interdisciplinary `borderwork' of gender studies. Through an analysis of specific regimes and locations for the making and re-making of gender difference, it develops a number of contemporary themes: the positioning of indigenous men and women; gendered experience in youth and later life; linguistic practices; the home and homelessness; violence and complicity; sexual identities; power and visibility in representation; the legal subject and the citizen; male and female agency in the public work of the nation; backlash and the men's movement; self-definition and the possibility of rethinking obligations. Students will be expected to take an active, collaborative part in the collection of contemporary examples of theoretical work and applications, and should be prepared, through the writing of the journal and their assessment pieces of work, to reflect on their own experience.

Assessment Journal (2100 words): 35%
* Seminar paper (1800 words): 30%
* Major essay (2100 words): 35%

Recommended texts

Buchbinder D Masculinities and identities MUP, 1994
Butler J Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversive identity Routledge, 1993
Carrington K Offending girls Allen and Unwin, 1993
Grosz E Volatile bodies: Towards a corporeal feminism Allen and Unwin, 1994
Hearn J and Morgan D (eds) Men, masculinities and social theory Unwin Hyman, 1990
Langford R Don't take your love to town Penguin, 1988
Saunders K and Evans R (eds) Gender relations in Australia: Domination and negotiation HBJ, 1992
The polity reader in gender studies Polity Press, 1994