POLS/WS 3216: Women in Political Development 9-27 May Intensive Session 2011, 9:00 am 12 noon, CLAS 164

Transcription

1 MAY 2011 POLS/WS 3216: Women in Political Development 9-27 May Intensive Session 2011, 9:00 am 12 noon, CLAS 164 Professor Heather M. Turcotte Political Science, Women s Studies, & International Studies Office: 224 Monteith heather.turcotte@uconn.edu Please Note: All aspects of this syllabus are subject to change at the discretion of Prof. Turcotte. Overview This course is an interdisciplinary approach to the study of political development in its relation to the category women and to the production of gender. We will explore how social, political and cultural constructions of sexual difference influence the knowledge and practice of political life on a global scale. Of particular focus is the ways in which power is gendered and how gender has served as a basis for political organization, the distribution of power, and the boundaries of citizenship. Taking into consideration the continued state of war within world affairs, this course is designed to place the question of women and political development in the context of the various international frameworks that purport to grant rights, equality and protections to women in conflict zones. Towards this end, we will consider questions governing the relationship of gender to the state, development, security, human rights and academia from a transnational perspective. Requirements Readings assigned for each class date are to be completed prior to that meeting. (1) DAILY reading comprehension quizzes in class; (2) ONE written final; and (3) Class Participation (in-class verbal, writing and collective exercises) Texts *Please note some of the readings are located on the Electronic Course Reserves ( noted in syllabus) found on HuskyCT. Textbooks may be purchased at the University Co-Op. REQUIRED: 1. Zillah Eisenstein, Sexual Decoys: Gender, Race, and War in Imperial Democracy, Zed Books, Andrea Smith, Conquest: Sexual Violence and the American Indian Genocide, South End Press, Kristin Bumiller, In an Abusive State: How Neoliberalism Appropriated the Feminist Movement against Sexual Violence, Duke UP, 2008 No late work will be accepted without prior consent and please turn off cell phone ring tones. Breakdown of Grades Reading Quizzes 25% Final 25% Class Participation 50%

2 Turcotte, POLS/WS 3216 May 2011 Page 2 Knowledge is a way of ordering the world and is inseparable from social organization. We all come to the classroom from different locations and diverse epistemological approaches to understanding the world around us. The classroom is a meeting place for cultural traffic and we will utilize this vital space for collective intellectual examination and growth that is attentive to the multiple workings of power within academia and state policy frameworks. Particular attention will be paid to the ways knowledges are disseminated, mobilized and reproduced in various historical contexts through course readings and exercises, films, lectures and our discussions. We will focus on closecritical reading, speaking and writing practices to develop effective global communication skills and to further explore approaches to understanding global inequalities and our position, complicities and accountabilities within these global structures. This course demands that you grapple with historical issues and contradictions that emerge throughout the course in relationship to your own social and political realities and locations, and it encourages you to articulate these connections in various formats. The success of the course depends on your preparation for and participation in class discussion and activities, which involves completing the assigned reading prior to the class, understanding the major themes in the reading and contributing questions and issues for discussion. It is beneficial to maintain a list of critical concepts/vocabulary for yourselves, highlight the central themes and questions of the readings and focus on concepts that flow throughout and between the readings e.g., What is the significance of the readings? How do the readings speak to each class and week s theme? How do the themes come together to formulate different understandings of women and politics? Do the author s make similar or contrasting arguments? How are ideas of geopolitics, the international and development surfacing within the text? What are the sets of relations between different modes of global politics? What are the ways in which race, gender, sexuality and nation are mobilized in different moments? Why are these readings important to an understanding of how to theoretically and methodologically think about global power, institutions, relations, violence, and justice? Where do you fit into these discussions?

3 May 9 th Introductions Turcotte, POLS/WS 3216 May 2011 Page 3 Women and the State (System) May 10 th Contextualizing Bodies Enloe, Cynthia. Gender Makes the World Go Round. Bananas, Beaches & Bases. Berkeley: University of California Press, Pettman, Jan Jindy. Women, Gender, and the State. Worlding Women: Feminist International Politics. New York: Routledge, Shepherd, Laura J. Sex or Gender? Bodies in World Politics and Why Gender Matters. Gender Matters in Global Politics: A Feminist Introduction to International Relations. New York: Routledge, May 11 th Mapping the Global Film: Noho Hewa the Wrongful Occupation of Hawaiʻi Mohanty, Chandra T. Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses. Feminist Review No. 30 (Autumn 1988): Teaiwa, Teresia. Bikinis and Other S/pacific N/oceans. Militarized Currents: Toward a Decolonized Future in Asia and the Pacific. Setsu Shigematsu and Keith L. Camacho, eds. Minneapolis: Minnesota Press, 2010 [1994] Fernandes, Leela. Rethinking Globalization: Gender and the Nation in India. Feminist Locations: Global and Local, Theory and Practice. Ed. Marianne Dekoven. New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, May 12 th De-Colonizing Histories Film: Clips of This is What Democracy Looks Like Recommended Film: Flame Mama, Amina. Sheroes and Villains: Conceptualizing Colonial and Contemporary Violence Against Women in Africa. Feminist Genealogies, Colonial Legacies, Democratic Futures. Eds. M. Jacqui Alexander and Chandra Talpade Mohanty. New York: Routledge, Prashad, Vijay. Selections from The Darker Nations: A People s History of the Third World. New York: The New Press, xv-61. May 13 th State Building Film: In the White Man s Image BOOK Smith, Andrea. Conquest, to 107.

4 Turcotte, POLS/WS 3216 May 2011 Page 4 May 16 th Anti-Colonial Film: Clips from the Wellbriety Movement BOOK Smith, Andrea. Conquest, 108-end Global Political Economies May 17 th Development Film: Poto Mitan Haitian Women, Pillars of the Global Economy Escobar, Arturo. The Invention of Development. Current History (Nov 1999): Rowley, Michelle. A Feminist s Oxymoron: Globally Gender-Conscious Development. Confronting Power, Theorizing Gender: Interdisciplinary Perspectives in the Caribbean. Ed. Eudine Barriteau. Kingston: University of the West Indies, May 18 th Labor Migrations Film: The Card Game & Insecure Communities: Families Under Threat Grace Chang, Global Exchange: The World Bank, Welfare Reform, and the Trade in Migrant Women. Disposable Domestics: Immigrant Women Workers in the Global Economy. Cambridge: South End Press, Boo, Katherine. The Churn: Creative Destruction in a Border Town. The New Yorker. March 29, 2004 available: May 19 th Border Violence Film: Performing the Border & Clips from Maquilapolis Recommended Film: Señorita Extraviada Falcón, Sylvanna. Securing the Nation through the Violation of Women s Bodies: Militarized Border Rape at the US-Mexico Border. Color of Violence: the Incite! Anthology. Ed. Incite! Women of Color Against Violence. Cambridge: South End, Rodríguez, Dylan. "I Would Wish Death on You..."Race, Gender, and Immigration in the Globality of the U.S. Prison Regime Davis, Angela and Gina Dent. Prison as a Border: A Conversation on Gender, Globalization, and Punishment.

5 May 20th War Film: My Daughter the Terrorist & Clips from the Battle of Algiers Turcotte, POLS/WS 3216 May 2011 Page 5 Cohn, Carol. Sex and Death in the Rational World of Defense Intellectuals. Signs 12.4 (1987): BOOK Eisenstein, Zillah. Sexual Decoys, to p. 48. May 23 rd Democracy Film: Iron Ladies of Liberia BOOK Eisenstein, Zillah Sexual Decoys, 49 to end. Rights & Law May 24 th Legal Discourse Matsuda, Mari. Beside My Sister, Facing the Enemy: Legal Theory out of Coalition. Standford Law Review. Vol. 43 No. 6 (July 1991): Ticktin, Miriam. Sexual Violence as the Language of Border Control: Where French Feminist and Anti-Immigrant Rhetoric Meet. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society (2008): BOOK Bumiller, Kristin. In an Abusive State, to p. 62. May 25 th Feminist Movement Film: Pray the Devil Back to Hell BOOK Bumiller, In an Abusive State, p. 63 to end May 26 th Pluralities of Justice Film: The Fourth World War Shaw, Rosalind. Rethinking Truth and Reconciliation Commissions: Lessons from Sierra Leone. U.S. Institute of Peace Special Report 130. February Washington, DC. May 27 th Final Romany, Celina. Themes for a Conversation on Race and Gender in International Human Rights Law. Global Critical Race Feminism: An International Reader. Ed. Adrien Katherine Wing. New York: New York UP, Selected Poems