Gender Studies: Philosophy pathway

Core Modules

• Gender Theory

  This module is designed to provide an intersectional understanding of gender theory, attending to inequalities between women as well as between women and men, and the structures, ideas, and practices that (re)produce them. Students will gain an understanding from a variety of different disciplinary perspectives, across the humanities, arts, social sciences, and sciences and will engage with how genders and sexualities matter in everyday contexts; how gender is lived and experienced; the conceptual and practical interdependence of genders and other key social and political concepts; the dimensions of gender-based and sexual violence; women’s agency; and the social construction of masculinities and femininities.

• Methods and Methodologies for Gender Studies

  This interdisciplinary module will introduce students to gender studies research and discuss the diverse methodological approaches undertaken by gender studies scholars. It examines the ontological and epistemological commitments that underpin feminist approaches to methodology as well as provides an introduction to research design and quantitative and qualitative methods and feminist critiques thereof. The modules is structured themes around knowing and researching gender, designing a research project in gender studies, which kind of questions to ask, ethical gender research including general ethics principles and feminist ethics, and sex and gender as a variable, discourse, narrative and a social construct.

• Practices of Gender/Gendered Research

  The module will address the practices of gender research, gender activism and the practices of living gender and gendering across a wide variety of professional situations. Teaching will include the unique ways in which gender perspectives, feminist theory and queer theory combine theory and methodology into practice. Students will be provided with the opportunity to individually and collectively perform several practices of gender theories and gender research that are discussed in the classroom.

• Gender Studies Dissertation

  This module is designed for you to carry out a piece of independent research supervised by a member of the gender studies academic staff. The 10,000 – 12,000 words dissertation should engage in-depth with a topic or question in gender studies from a theoretical, empirical or practice-based point of view. You will submit a short research outline in the spring term, which is used to assign a supervisor with relevant expertise. Workshops will be arranged during the academic year to discuss requirements and how to manage a dissertation project and best-practice for writing. The dissertation will be submitted at the end of August.

• Academic Integrity

  This module will describe the key principles of academic integrity, focusing on university assignments. Plagiarism, collusion and commissioning will be described as activities that undermine academic integrity, and the possible consequences of engaging in such activities will be described. Activities, with feedback, will provide you with opportunities to reflect and develop your understanding of academic integrity principles.

   

Optional Modules

There are a number of optional course modules available during your degree studies. The following is a selection of optional course modules that are likely to be available. Please note that although the College will keep changes to a minimum, new modules may be offered or existing modules may be withdrawn, for example, in response to a change in staff. Applicants will be informed if any significant changes need to be made.

You will choose 15 credits/one module from the three optional Gender Studies modules (two are offered each year)

• Body and Embodiment

  Drawing on a wide range of multidisciplinary of debates, cutting-edge theories and approaches across the field of body studies, queer theory, feminist theory, cultural studies and sociology, this module aims to provide timely and novel ways of thinking about the significance of the body and embodied relations in our contemporary era. It does so critically examining the implications of embodied cultural patterns in the formation of social processes, communication processes, and the political and cultural creation and reinforcement of inequalities.

  Through a range of multimodal approaches that involve both visual and textual resources you will be encouraged to immerse yourself in debates and perspectives around marginalisation, spatial segregation, disobedience, transgression, desire, disability, inclusion, bodily manipulation, representation and misrepresentation, (self)identity, subjectivity, mental health, biomedics, affects and governance.

• Gender, Power and Protest

  Women and other non-dominant groups are often excluded from public spaces and political decision-making.  This module looks at the ways in which gender shapes social mobilisation and protest and how those areas influence political outcomes. It takes a gender and intersectional lens to analyse how women’s mobilisation and protest articulate strategies and policy demands and how social movements challenge and interface with the state.

  You will explore how gender and intersectionality shape political outcomes including regime transitions, conflict resolution, and policy change, and how movements come to define success or why social movements succeed, fail, or experience backlash and inspire the rise of counter movements. The module takes a comparative approach to familiarise you with different social mobilisations and protest movements around gender and social and political change, and how diverse women’s participation in these movements influences domestic and international politics.

• Gender and Technologies

And 60 credits from the Philosophy themed optional modules offered by the Department of Politics, International Relations and Philosophy (PIRP).

Indicative modules include:

• Advanced Topics in Philosophy I

  The aim of this module is to allow students to engage with research from across the range of philosophical sub-fields. The module also allows students to develop their understanding of the nature of philosophy and the diversity of philosophical methods, as well to further improve their abilities at written and oral communication of philosophical ideas and arguments. The module will be taught by a number of philosophers who teach on the wider MA programmes, and will be divided into four parts, each presenting a five week introduction to a topic researched by the academic. It will allow students enrolled on the different MA Philosophy streams to compare approaches, and see their own specialism within a wider philosophical context.

• Political Concepts

  The module aims to give an advanced grounding in the central ideas and concepts in contemporary Anglo-American political theory, enabling you to engage in its ongoing debates, and to acquire a sense of the state of the discipline as a whole.  Attention will be paid to some of the main ideas and concepts of contemporary political theory, including political obligation, punishment, egalitarianism, meritocracy, human rights, and global justice.  Throughout, we will explore how different thinkers have offered different theoretical articulations of these ideas, as well as their practical implications. The module aims to enable you to offer critiques and commentary of various positions in contemporary political theory, and to develop your own ideas.

• Identity, Power and Radical Political Theory

  This module aims to introduce students to new conceptualizations of identity, difference, power, and politics that are associated most notably with what has been termed “Post-Marxist” or “New Left” politics and political philosophy.  Its premise is that recent changes in both political theory and practice – some of which are associated with changes linked to globalization and the emergence of new social movements – are compelling a paradigm shift in the way politics is understood.  It will focus on four concepts – identity, power, resistance, and otherness – that have become salient in contemporary political philosophy and international relations theory and on four theorists – Althusser, Gramsci, Laclau & Mouffe, and Foucault – whose thought on these issues has underpinned a great deal of “New Left” political theory and practice.  It will also look at how these issues and theories have become prominent in the theory and politics around feminism and lesbian politics and at new problematics for thinking about political thought and practice, with particular focus on what has been called the “micropolitical” realm.

• Twentieth Century French Philosophy

  The aim of this module is to give students an understanding of the key moments in the development of the Twentieth century French philosophical tradition. The focus will be on showing how the French tradition develops an alternative approach to philosophical problems on the basis of the perceived failure of classical analytical approaches. The module will also allow students to engage with a number of theorists, studying key texts in depth, and will further develop their ability to express, question, and justify theoretical theories, both dialogically, and in writing.

• Contemporary Political Thinkers

  This module engages with a selection of recent work by major political thinkers from a variety of intellectual approaches The focus is on an examination of some of influential recent work in political theory, along with critical commentary on them. We’ll be looking at issues such as hate speech, shaming punishments, recognition, immigration, multiculturalism, partiality towards compatriots and global justice. The module requires a commitment to read selections from the texts we’ll be analysing, aided by seminars where we’ll be discussing their ideas, arguments and themes.

• Race, Gender and Queer Philosophy