Description
[cross-listed with SOC 3701; G/C; Social Practice minor] This course is a multidisciplinary study of the scholarship on women, with an introduction to feminist theory and methodology. As Maxine Hong Kingston explains, a woman warrior must “make (her) mind large, as the universe is large, so that there is room for paradoxes.” This course will explore the various paradoxes involved in constructing the concept of the woman warrior by looking at historical and contemporary experiences of women at the micro level (personal and individual), the meso level (community, neighborhood, etc.), the macro level (national), and the global level. We will examine representations of female identity in literary works such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” and Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior. In addition, we will look at imposed standards of beauty (i.e., foot-binding) and social codes of conduct that contribute to the formulation of the ideal female image. Specific attention will al