GWS 495-01 - Senior Seminar: Feminist Evisceration

4 credits (Spring)

How does feminist theory treat its objects of study? How do feminists relate to one another and the world around them? This course examines the critical cultures of academic and activist feminism with an emphasis on evaluating feminism’s tendency to eviscerate or annihilate its objects. While evisceration is useful as a feminist method among many, we will look at moments such as the feminist sex wars when feminism’s commitment to evisceration as a singular method has harmful effects, including to feminists and feminism itself. Following a survey of feminism’s history with evisceration, we will engage with contemporary discourses on cancel culture and examine alternatives to evisceration, including recent feminist conversations on restorative and transformative justice. Aimed at graduating seniors in GWSS, the course gives students an opportunity to reflect on ways to live with and use their feminist educations.

Prerequisite: GWS 111, GWS 249, with grades S, C, or better, and Senior Gender, Women’s, and Sexuality Studies major.
Instructor: Allen