Why do women's studies? a cross england profile

Letherby, Gayle; Marchbank, Jennifer

doi:10.1016/s0277-5395(01)00191-1

Cited by 13 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Such negative assessments of WGS are conveyed to students through teachers and others. A survey in the UK revealed that even among students who choose to concentrate in WGS, the majority had heard disparaging comments about the value of WGS and had heard more negative than positive comments about WGS as an academic field (Letherby & Marchbank, 2001).…”

Section: Contrasting Views Of Wgsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pedagogy and student change in the women's and gender studies classroom

Stake

2006

Gender and Education

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Women's and gender studies (WGS) classes and programmes have been developed on many university and college campuses around the world. Despite some success in the establishment of WGS in higher education, WGS has been the target of significant criticism. Detractors of WGS have charged that WGS is intellectually frivolous and that WGS teachers focus excessively on students' personal thoughts and experiences, are intolerant of differing opinions, present a narrow political ideology and, in many cases, cause distress to students. In contrast, WGS pedagogists have emphasized the importance of allowing students to express their thoughts and opinions and of developing openmindedness and scholarly, critical thinking. Further, they have asserted that WGS courses promote important educational goals, including increased awareness of sexism and other social inequities, more egalitarian attitudes toward women and other traditionally oppressed groups, and active community involvement to promote social equality. This review considers the empirical evidence for these competing opinions of the value and impact of WGS.

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Section: Contrasting Views Of Wgsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pedagogy and student change in the women's and gender studies classroom

Stake

2006

Gender and Education

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“…Following Bourdieu's logic, this absence of 'symbolic capitalism' leads to 'symbolic violence' and attacks the minority culture. Or perhaps it is yet another example of the fear of the 'F' word: we know that whenever feminism appears to be gaining ground (both within and outside of the academy) a whole series of repressive, political, social, economic and ideological forces are mobilized in direct response (see Hartsock, 1990;Faludi, 1992;Coppock et al, 1995;Letherby & Marchbank, 2001). As Stanley (1997) notes, we know that feminism in the academy takes place in an academic borderland:…”

Section: Dominant Perceptions and Prejudicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…(Evans, 1997, p. 122) Notes 1. The institutional comparative aspect of our research is discussed in Letherby and Marchbank (2001). 2.…”

Section: Reflections and Responsesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Here we focus on the one university (the institution we both worked in at the time of the fieldwork) where we also canvassed the views of non-women's studies students. 1 Our research derived from the observation that although there is a considerable literature in both the UK and North America on women's studies (see, for example, Aaron & Walby, 1991), less has been written about the student experience of women's studies (exceptions being Griffin, 1994;Coate-Bignell, 1996;Price & Owen, 1998;Harris et al, 1999;Letherby & Marchbank, 2001;Maher, 2001) and even less about non-women's studies students' views of women's studies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Views and perspectives of women’s studies: a survey of women and men students

Marchbank

Letherby

2006

Gender and Education

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In this article we draw on data from a completed project entitled Why Do Women's Studies? involving five English Universities. However, the data reported here focuses on a single institution. The data were collected through questionnaires which combined quantitative and qualitative questions and we have the views of three distinct groups of students: students taking women's studies as a degree; students taking other degrees but including women's studies modules and students with no experience of women's studies. After detailing our method and reflecting on some methodological issues we present and debate our data which shows that although many of the conventional stereotypes regarding women's studies remain in common discourses they seem to be agreed with less than they are reported to have been heard. Yet, the power of these discourses remains a danger to women's studies as evidenced by its demise as an undergraduate course in many English institutions.

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“…As a complex and contradictory being, the feminist academic is represented in feminist thought as nurturing Acker, 1999), and contradictorily by students as aggressive and threatening in their identification of feminists as man-hating, lesbian, or psychopathic (see Culley, 1985;Kitzinger & Thomas, 1995;Volman & Ten Dam, 1998;Langan & Paquin, 2000;Bulbeck, 2001;Letherby & Marchbank, 2001). Our (Davidson and Langan) public identity as feminists, our work in the course on feminist theory, and Mavis's association with us combined to foster the perspective that she too was a feminist (Mavis is often public about her feminist identity, but did not explicitly proclaim herself a 'feminist' during the lecture).…”

Section: As If That's Not Enough She's a F-e-m-i-n-i-s-t!!!mentioning

confidence: 99%

The breastfeeding incident: teaching and learning through transgression

Davidson

Langan

2006

Studies in Higher Education

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The authors describe what happened when feminist teaching came head to breast with mothering. The authors' attempt to impact student responses to feminist theorizing in a third-year social psychology class met with transgressions when a colleague, who had been invited as a guest-lecturer to speak about social structure and violence against women, brought her three-year-old and fivemonth-old sons with her. During her presentation, when her youngest child started to fuss she breastfed him while she lectured. What followed in later class discussions informed the students about their own contradictory investments in dominant discourses, and informed the authors that a breastfeeding feminist university teacher represents transgressions in the academy. The authors discovered through a reflective and layered analysis of the incident that the breastfeeding feminist university teacher is subjected, not merely to a 'chilly climate' or an intellectualized 'symbolic violence', but, tersely-to violence-because she is a woman who is also an academic.We all agreed that it was empowering for us to see the image of Mavis [our guest-lecturer] as a mother, academic and breadwinner. We were given the image of a woman who had conquered all of the domains of life. Yet, when she began to breastfeed some in our group expressed being uncomfortable with the amalgamation of her domestic and scholarly identities. (Comment, written by a student, about 'the breastfeeding incident' [also cited in Langan & Davidson 2005, p. 141].)

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Why do women's studies? a cross england profile

Cited by 13 publications

References 12 publications

Pedagogy and student change in the women's and gender studies classroom

Pedagogy and student change in the women's and gender studies classroom

Views and perspectives of women’s studies: a survey of women and men students

The breastfeeding incident: teaching and learning through transgression

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