Genders, Bodies, Borders

This subject has the following teaching availabilities in 2010:

For the purposes of considering requests for Reasonable Adjustments under the Disability Standards for Education (Cwth 2005), and Students Experiencing Academic Disadvantage Policy, academic requirements for this subject are articulated in the Subject Description, Subject Objectives, Generic Skills and Assessment Requirements of this entry.

The University is dedicated to provide support to those with special requirements. Further details on the disability support scheme can be found at the Disability Liaison Unit website : http://www.services.unimelb.edu.au/disability/

This subject brings insights from contemporary feminist theory (drawn from a range of disciplines) and moves to examine the ways in which highly gendered cultural contests about identity have erupted both nationally and globally in recent years. We focus on the body and bodies as central to these contests.

Issues of femininity, masculinity, beauty, fatness, thinness, the veil, porno-chic, gay marriage, nationalism, religion, secularism and multiculturalism and clashes around human rights and cultural values are considered.

Students who successfully complete this subject will develop a:

• sound understanding of the main developments in feminist thinking about the relationships between "culture", gender and identity and the intersections of gender, "race", ethnicity and class.
• a sound understanding of key concepts in contemporary feminist and postmodernist thought.
• an awareness of the interrelationships between major social divisions including those of gender, race, ethnicity, class and sexuality.
• an ability to locate these social divisions in specific cultural and historical contexts, with particular emphasis on cross-cultural comparisons
• an understanding of contemporary theories on historical and cultural contests around sex, gender,sexuality and bodies.

A reader will be available at the university bookshop.

This subject potentially can be taken as a breadth subject component for the following courses:

• Bachelor of Biomedicine
• Bachelor of Commerce
• Bachelor of Environments
• Bachelor of Music
• Bachelor of Science
• Bachelor of Engineering

You should visit learn more about breadth subjects and read the breadth requirements for your degree, and should discuss your choice with your student adviser, before deciding on your subjects.

Students who successfully complete this subject will:

• demonstrate research skills through competent use of the library and other information sources.
• show critical thinking and analysis and ability to communicate knowledge intelligibly and economically through recommended reading, essay writing and tutorial discussion, and by determining the strength of an argument.
• demonstrate understanding of social, ethical and cultural context through the contextualisation of judgements, developing a critical self-awareness, being open to new ideas and possibilities and by constructing an argument.

This is a core subject for the minor in the interdisciplinary program in gender studies. This subject may also be completed as part of the interdisciplinary program in the social theory minor and sequence. Students who have completed 131-034 prior to 2008 may not enrol in this subject.

This subject satisfies the third-year breadth requirement for third-year students in the Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Biomedicine when taken in 2010 only.