Department of Women's Studies

Women’s studies is the interdisciplinary study of the categorizations and processes that shape the relationship between women and men. It reveals the assumptions and actions that produce sex-based inequality by analyzing how gender operates in different domains. It takes as its basic principle the simple proposition that gender matters—it informs our choices, our behaviors, and our views of self and other—and aims, through critical interrogation and defiance of the prevailing gender order, to erode gender bias and create a world in which both women and men can be more fully human.

Women’s studies is an inclusive field of inquiry and recognizes human diversity in all its forms. It seeks to understand differences in our lived experiences as women and men as a result of socio-economic, racial-ethnic and marital status, age, religion, ability, and sexual orientation. Women’s studies is also transnational, examining the nexus between local and global so as to better understand cross-cultural unities and divisions.