WST 150 A-Z - (IS) Topics in Women’s Studies

Semester Hours: 3

This course will offer an in-depth study of major issues in Women’s and Gender Studies. Topics will reflect current developments in the field and will address issues such as women’s roles in work, family, sexuality, and reproduction; language, representation, and performance; feminist politics and policies; transnational and cross-cultural perspectives of gender; and the impact of science and technology on women’s lives.

Current Special Topics

WST 150B - Gender, Sexuality, Race, and the Vote

This year, we will highlight Black women’s activism for voting rights. We will focus on the role played by Black women’s literary societies and sororities and on key figures like Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Frances Ellen Watkins-Harper, bisexual poet Alice Dunbar Nelson, Fannie Lou Hamer, trans civil rights attorney Pauli Murray, and others who have continued the struggle for the Women’s Vote.

Crosslisted as AFST 187P , LGBT 181B , RHET 189N

WST 150D - (IS) Embodied Freedom: Reclaiming the Feminine in Movement

Every human, no matter what gender identity, has the Feminine and the Masculine Principle alive within them. Throughout Western culture, the feminine voice has been profoundly suppressed. This course will address the role of the body in our culture, exploring how the inner authority and feminine wisdom of the body have been repressed and devalued throughout time, and how listening to the voice of the body might support us in navigating the changes of our current social upheaval.

This course will be a highly experiential movement class working primarily with the contemplative corporeal practice Continuum. In Continuum, we explore the body as an unfolding process in dynamic relationship and communication with all life forms. The human body is comprised of primarily water, and essential qualities of water are its receptivity and adaptability. Texts for this course will support an inquiry into how culture shapes our bodies and freedom of movement, as well as the historical and ongoing dismissal of the body, and why the embodied feminine so often poses a threat to those in power.

Selections of texts for this course will come from numerous authors and sources such as Creation Myths by Marie-Louise von Franz, Engaging the Movement of Life by Bonnie Gintis, DO, Life on Land by Emilie Conrad, Descent to the Goddess by Sylvia Brinton Perera, Women who Run with the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes and The Chalice and the Blade by Riane Eisler.

The movement practice Continuum in no way resembles a dance class in which one is asked to learn a prescribed set of movements. No prior movement experience is required for this course. Instead, this course will offer a process of engaging one’s own personal exploration of movement with the goal of becoming more conscious of the sensation of life as it unfolds into our awareness through the communication of movement. (The director of the Hofstra Dance Program has indicated this course may be counted as a Dance elective toward the completion of Dance requirements for majors or minors.)

Crosslisted as DNCE 124A

WST 150E - Gender Justice: An international framework for conflict-related sexual and gender-based crimes

The course is designed to provide students with an overview of the road towards ending impunity for conflict-related sexual and gender-based crimes at the international level. The course will focus on the gender provisions of the Rome Statute, the work of the International Criminal Court (ICC), as well as the work of the United Nations towards addressing and ending impunity for conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence and crimes. Current court cases of gender-based crimes during conflict situations will be showcased during the course to contextualize the subject-matter.

Crosslisted as CRM 016

WST 150H - Paganism and Magic

This course explores contemporary pagan religions, from the occult to Wicca, Heathenry, and Hoodoo. We will explore their history as well as their racial and sexual politics, paying particular attention to the historical role these religions have played in enabling non-conforming experiences of gender.

Crosslisted as RELI 030 , LGBT 180W

WST 150O - Sex and the Body in Religious Studies

Given that religions often claim to be concerned with “spirit,” why are so many religions so preoccupied with sexuality, gender, and the body? This course will focus on a sampling of case studies (some chosen by the students enrolled) through which the class will explore the complex intersections of religion with the body in terms of race, gender, sexuality, and disability.

Crosslisted as LGBT 180Z and RELI 073

WST 150Y - (IS) LGBTQ+ Relationships

Without our relationships with others, the concepts of sexual orientation and gender identity would be largely unimportant; and without our close interpersonal relationships, our experience of ourselves and others as LGBTQ+ would be fundamentally different.

This course will provide a primarily psychological, sociological, and developmental view of LGBTQ+ relationships; however, coursework will provide opportunities for all majors to consider the applications of the topic to their major field of study and prospective careers.

Crosslisted as LGBT 180U

Prerequisite(s)/Course Notes:
Subjects will change from semester to semester and the course may be repeated for credit when topics vary. Specific titles and course descriptions for special topics courses are available in the online class schedule.

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Fall 2025

January 2026

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