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Fall 2026 Graduate Courses
[Core Courses]
WST 601 - Feminist Theories
Ritch Calvin
Tuesdays: 2:00-4:50pm
This course examines concepts and conversations that have played a key role in constituting
the field of women’s, gender, and sexuality studies and queer, feminist, and trans
scholarship more broadly. Far from promising a definitive or comprehensive overview
of feminist theory, each iteration of this course focuses on particular topics, themes,
and/or theoretical frameworks. As such, instructors model for students how to build
reading lists that track conceptual debates within the field or trace the contestations
and contradictions of particular feminist genealogies. Together, instructors and students
situate these concepts and conversations within broader historical, geopolitical,
and intellectual contexts in order to question the purpose of specific theories at
the moment of their emergence and to evaluate their current usefulness for developing
transnational and intersectional understandings of gender and sexuality. At its core,
this course attends to the ways in which the legacies of slavery, colonialism, and
cisheteronormativity have conditioned western feminist thought and seeks to support
students in developing theoretical tools for practicing distinctly anti-racist and
decolonial women’s, gender, and sexuality studies.
WST 610 - Advanced Topics in Women's Studies - "Immigration, borders, & national identity"
Nancy Hiemstra
Wednesdays: 2:00-4:50pm
This course examines the relationship between immigration, borders, and national identity
through an interdisciplinary range of theoretical and methodological frameworks. It
explores how laws, policies, and public discourses around immigration are used to
police territorial borders, economic regimes, and the boundaries of national belonging—historically
and in the present. We analyze how national identity is constructed in opposition
to a racialized, gendered, sexualized, and otherwise marked “Other,” and how these
constructions are reproduced through legal regimes, political rhetoric, and everyday
narratives. Attention is given to the role of media and political discourse in shaping
popular understandings of immigrants and citizenship. We further examine the spatial
dimensions of immigration enforcement, from symbolic and material borders to physical
sites and processes of marginalization, containment, and expulsion. While our studies
are grounded in the United States, we incorporate comparative case studies from around
the world. Students will critically engage in contemporary debates and complete a
final project aligned with their graduate program and research interests.
WST 680 - Proseminar: Navigating Graduate School and Beyond
Angela Jones
Thursdays: 2:00-4:50pm
The proseminar for first-year students aims to equip students for success in planning
and writing a dissertation, as well as for a professional life beyond graduate school.
The proseminar introduces students to university structures, expectations, and obligations.
Students will examine the WGSS Graduate Program Handbook, discussing all requirements,
policies, funding, mentorship, and teaching assistantships. Beyond program specifics,
students will discuss the history of the field of WGSS, its role within and outside
the academy, as well as the future of the field and career options. Finally, this
proseminar is rooted in the department's core values of accountability, anti-racism,
care, justice, and solidarity. It aims to create a community space for first-year
students to check in and support one another as they get acclimated to graduate school
life.
Fall 2026 WGSS-Related Electives
(If you see a course not listed here that you think might qualify as a WGSS- related
elective, email the WGSS Graduate Program Director, Professor Angela Jones at angela.n.jones@stonybrook.edu for approval)
EGL 586 - Topics in Gender Studies: "Gender and Sexuality in Education"
Ileana Jimenez
Wednesdays 5:00-7:50pm
This course explores the politics of gender and sexuality in schools and universities
by asking: How might we trace our embodied experiences of gender and sexuality throughout
our educational trajectories? How might we bring an intersectional lens to understanding
these experiences? Given our current political climate, how might we (re)center gender
and sexuality in curricula, pedagogy, and activism? Finally, how might we imagine
and implement feminist, queer, and trans futures in schools and universities? Readings
in this course include current education research in K-12 and university settings,
as well as a range of films, podcasts, and social media. Potential sessions include
feminist, queer, and trans theories and pedagogies; queer and trans youth in schools;
Black and Latina girlhoods; #MeToo and sexual violence in schools and universities;
boys and masculinities studies. We end the course with critical autoethnographic,
curricular, and school-based activism projects that outline urgent visions for liberatory
futures in education.
MUS 536 - Area Studies in Ethnomusicology: "Music, Sound and Tourism"
Ben Tausig
Mondays 2:00-4:50pm
Tourism accounts for roughly 10% of the global economy annually, and in almost all
aspects is suffused with music. From cruise ship bands to nightlife acts to cultural
events, musical labor keeps the engines of the tourist economy running. Entire musical
careers are oriented toward tourist audiences, and the financial power of these audiences
shapes local musics profoundly in turn. Meanwhile, music soundtracks everyday tourist
experiences in carefully considered ways. The relationship between music and tourism
has been the subject of much recent writing, especially in anthropology and ethnomusicology.
How is music integral to the functioning of tourism? What power imbalances and contradictions
might it reveal? How is musical practice affected by being situated in economies that
are dependent on tourism? Beyond music, sound itself is also a key element in tourism.
The sounds of touristic destinations are important markers of local specificity, and
are managed to convey particular moods and to meet particular expectations. These
sounds can be analyzed to understand how race and gender in particular are ever-present
components of tourism. This course will engage with literature (as well as media)
from music and sound studies, gender studies, critical race studies, history, and
anthropology to examine these topics in detail. Coursework includes weekly readings and Brightspace postings, one presentation and
discussion-leading, regular assignments, and a final paper.
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