Welcome to the UCLA Department of Women's Studies
The Department of Women's Studies provides interdisciplinary academic programs that are both nationally and transnationally oriented. The undergraduate program offers a Bachelor of Arts degree and a minor (since 1987); the graduate program offers Master of Arts (for Ph.D. students only, no terminal Master's) and Ph.D. degrees (since 1999). We currently have close to 200 undergraduate majors, over 45 minors, and 26 Ph.D. students.
Students develop critical reasoning and analytical skills, a deep appreciation for complexities of power and asymmetries in gender relations across time, class, and cultures, and conceptual tools for social change.
The Women's Studies curriculum challenges the pervasive theory/practice divide within the academy. In both our undergraduate and graduate courses, we teach students a broad range of methodological and analytical skills. Core undergraduate courses contextualize foundational theories and key analytical concepts within the study of different historical periods and social movements. In designating these courses "Power," "Knowledge," and "Bodies," we identify three primary areas in which feminist inquiry has been concentrated over time, enabling students to trace grounding concepts, key controversies, and the emergence of new theoretical paradigms.
Women's Studies at UCLA has long enjoyed recognition for its strengths in areas including women's history, feminist science studies, Middle East women's studies, and gender and the law. Over the past several years, the Department has become a leading center for interdisciplinary intersectional feminist scholarship on gender, sexuality, race, class, and nationality, and is building a strong reputation in the areas of transnational literary and media studies, postcolonial feminist studies, and studies of settler colonialism
Check out the 2010 Department of Women's Studies Newsletter for departmental, faculty, and student updates!
Photo Album: Departmentalization Gala Photos have been added!
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