sketch by Rini Templeton

Course Description

This course will explore constructions of gender in the context of socio-political conflict. We will study (1) the ways in which gender roles are reconfigured and women are drawn into the various overlapping contexts of anti-colonial and ethnic nationalisms, war, international politics, race and class struggles; and (2) the responses of women and women's groups to these constructions of gender, and the processes by which particular feminist ideologies have emerged in response to such conflicts. We will pay particular attention to the relationship of gender to the Nation-State, and the ways in which violent conflicts between communities are differently enacted on the bodies of men and women. A parallel focus of this course will be an exploration of women's participation in situations of conflict, either as ‘soldiers' or communal representatives themselves, or as peace-builders and activists against war.