ANTH 450 -- GENDER IN CROSS-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE

Professor: Valentina Pagliai

Oberlin College

 

TU 1:00-2:45pm

 

Office: King 320a

Phone: (440) 775-8372 office

(440) 250-9676 home

(440) 840-4719 portable

Office Hours: M W 1:30-2:30pm

(Or by appointment)

E-mail: valentina.pagliai@oberlin.edu

 

Course Description: This course will examine cross-cultural images of manhood and womanhood as well as the debate in anthropology on the ways in which ≥genders≤ and ≥sexualities≤ should be understood and studied.  The course will center on gender identities as performed and it will address several topics including: feminist perspectives in anthropology; the historical development of ideas of masculinity/femininity; gender and language; cross-cultural constructions of motherhood and caring; gender in colonial and post-colonial perspective; sexuality and desire; and gender and power.

 

Course Goals:

1) To understand the theories that have shaped the study of gender in anthropology.

2) To understand the evolution in the study of gender from the sixties until today.

3) To learn how to reanalyze the problem of gender from a comparative perspective.

4) To further the studentsπ reflexive and theoretical/critical abilities.

 

Required texts:

1) R.W. Connell 1995  ≥Masculinities.≤ University of California Press: Berkeley & Los Angeles.

2) Additional Readings: Copies of the course's additional readings are in reserve in the campus Library.  The readings will also be available through e-reserve by the second week of classes.

 

 

WEEK 1 -- TU 2/5 -- Introduction to the course.

 

 

WEEK 2 -- TU 2/12 -- The question of gender: Emergence.

 

Readings:

1) Chodorow, Nancy 1974  ≥Family Structure and Feminine Personality.≤ In M. Z. Rosaldo & L. Lamphere (Eds.) Woman, Culture, and Society. Stanford: Stanford University Press. (43-66).

2) Ortner, Sherry B. 1974  ≥Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture?≤ In Rosaldo & Lamphere. (67-87).

3) Sachs, Karen 1974 ≥Engels Revisited: Women, the organization of Production, and Private Property.≤ In Rosaldo & Lamphere.  (Pp. 211-234).

4) Collier, Jane F. 1974  ≥Women in Politics.≤ In Rosaldo & Lamphere. (Pp. 89-96). 

 

Suggested Readings:

1) Michelle Z. Rosaldo: ≥Woman, Culture, and Society: A Theoretical Overview.≤ (17-42)

 

WEEK 3 -- TU 2/19 -- The question of Gender: emergence. Female Power and Male Dominance.

 

Readings:

1)  Adrienne L. Zihlman 1981 ≥Women as Shapers of Human Adaptation.≤ In F. Fahlberg (Ed.) Woman the Gatherer. New Haven and London: Yale UP. (76-111).

2)  Sanday, Peggy Reeves 1981 Female Power and Male Dominance: On the Origins of Sexual Inequality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Ch. 1: Scripts for Female Power (Pp. 15-34);

Ch. 2: Scripts for Male Dominance (Pp. 35-51);

Ch. 6: The Bases for Female Political and Economic Power and Authority (Pp. 113-134);

Ch. 7: The Decline of Womenπs World: The Effect of Colonialism (Pp. 135-162).

 

Suggested Readings:

1)  Weiner, Annette B. 1976 Women of Value, Men of Renown: New Perspectives in Trobriand Exchange. Austin & London: University of Texas Press.

2)  Margaret W. Conkey 1991 ≥Contexts of Action, Contexts of Power: Material Culture and Gender in the Magdalenian.≤ In J. M. Gero & M. W. Conkey (Eds.) Engendering Archaeology: Women and Prehistory. Basil Blackwell.

3)  Friedl, E. 1986  ≥The Position of Women: Appearance and Reality.≤ In J. Dubisch (ed.) Gender and Power in Rural Greece. Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ.

 

 

WEEK 4 -- TU 2/26 -- The criticism to anthropology and the debate with post-modernism.

 

Readings:

1) Marilyn Strathern 1987 ≥An Awkward Relationship: The Case of Feminism and Anthropology≤ In Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 1987, vol. 12, no. 2:276-292.

2) Alison Wylie 1991 ≥Gender Theory and the Archaeological Record: Why Is There No Archaeology of Gender?≤ In J. M. Gero & M. W. Conkey (Eds.) Engendering Archaeology: Women and Prehistory. Basil Blackwell.

3) Jane Flax 1987 ≥Postmodernism and Gender Relations in Feminist Theory.≤ In Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 1987, vol. 12, no. 4:621-643.

4) Frances E. Mascia-Lees, Patricia Sharpe, and Colleen Ballerino-Cohen 1989 ≥The Postmodernist Turn in Anthropology: Cautions from a Feminist Perspective.≤ In Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 1989, vol. 15, no. 1.

 

Suggested Readings:

1) Minh-ha, Trinh T. 1989 ≥Difference: A Special Third World Women Issue.≤ From Woman, Native, Other. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.

2) Moore, H. L. 1988  Feminism and Anthropology. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.

 

 

WEEK 5 -- TU 3/5 -- Gender and Language: Origins and development of the debate:

 

Readings:

1)  Keenan, Elinor 1974  ≥Norm-Makers, Norm-Breakers: Uses of Speech by Men and Women in a Malagasy Community.≤ In R. Bauman & J Sherzer (Eds.) Explorations in the Ethnography of Speaking. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

2)  Lakoff, Robin 1975 ≥Language and Womanπs Place.≤ Language in Society (45-80).

3)  Tannen, Deborah 1990 ≥Put Down That Paper and Talk to Me!≤ Rapport-talk and Report-Talk.  In You Just Donπt Understand: Women and Men in Conversation. New York: Ballantine Books. (Pp. 74-95)

4)  Uchida, Achi 1998 ≥When åDifferenceπ is åDominance:π A Critique of the åAnti-Power-Basedπ Cultural Approach to Sex Differences.≤  In D. Cameron (Ed.) The Feminist Critique to Language: A Reader. London and New York: Routledge.  (Pp. 280-291)

5)  Ochs, E. 1992. Indexing Gender. In A. Duranti & C. Goodwin (eds.) Rethinking Context. Language as an Interactive Phenomenon. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.  (Pp. 336-355). 

 

Suggested Readings:

1)  Eckert, Penelope & Sally McConnell-Ginet 1992 ≥Think Practically and Look Locally: Language and Gender as Community-Based Practice.≤  In Annual Review of Anthropology, 1992, 21:461-490.

2)  Tannen, Deborah 1998 ≥The Relativity of Linguistic Strategies: Rethinking Power and Solidarity in Gender and Dominance.≤ In D. Cameron (Ed.) The Feminist Critique to Language: A Reader. London and New York: Routledge. (Pp. 261-279).

 

 

WEEK 6 -- TU 3/12 -- Performed genders, performed sexualities.

 

Readings:

1) West, Candace & Zimmerman, Don H. 1991 ≥Doing Gender.≤ In J. Lorber & S. A. Farrell (Eds.) The Social Construction of Gender.  London: Sage Publications.  (Pp. 13-34).

2)  Riley, D. 1988  åAm I That Name?π Feminism and the Category of åWomenπ in History. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.

3)  Coates, Jennifer  1998 ≥åThank God Iπm a Woman:π The Construction of Differing Femininities.≤ In D. Cameron (Ed.) The Feminist Critique to Language: A Reader. London and New York: Routledge.  (Pp. 295-319) 

4) Caraveli, A. 1986  åThe Bitter Wounding: The Lament as Social Protest in Rural Greece.π in J. Dubisch (ed.) Gender and Power in Rural Greece. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ.

Other. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. (Pp. 169-194).

 

Suggested Readings:

1)  Dubisch, J. 1995  In a Different Place: Pilgrimage, Gender and Politics at a Greek Island Shrine. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ.

 

 

WEEK 7 -- TU 3/19 -- Gendered bodies: history of womenπs bodies, childbirth.

 

Readings:

1) Fausto-Sterling, Anne 2000 ≥Beyond Difference: Feminism and Evolutionary Psychology.≤ In H. Rose & S. Rose (Eds.) Alas Poor Darwin: Arguments Against Evolutionary Psychology. New York: Harmony Books. (Pp. 209-224). 

2) Martin, Emily 1987  The Woman in the Body: A Cultural Analysis of Reproduction.  Boston: Beacon Press. (Pp. xi-xviii, 15-67, 71-138).

 

Suggested Readings:

1) Martin, Emily 1987  The Woman in the Body: A Cultural Analysis of Reproduction.  Boston: Beacon Press. (Pp. 166-178).

 

WEEK 8  --  SPRING BREAK

 

 

WEEK 9 -- TU 4/2 -- Gender and the family. Models of motherhood and caring.

 

Readings:

1) Jane F. Collier & Sylvia J. Yanagisako 1987 ≥Introduction≤ & ≥Toward a Unified Analysis of Gender and Kinship.≤ In J. F. Collier & S. J. Yanagisako (Eds.) Gender and Kinship: Essays Toward a Unified Analysis.  (Pp. 1-50).

2)  DπArgemir, D. C. 1994  ≥Gender Relationships and Social Change in Europe: on Support and Care.≤ In V.A. Goddard, J.R. Llobera & C. Shore (eds.) 1994. The Anthropology of Europe. Identities and Boundaries in Conflict. Berg, Oxford & Providence. (Pp. 209-222).

3)  Dolgin, Janet L. 1995 ≥Family Law and the Facts of Family.≤ In S. Yanagisako & C. Delaney (Eds.) Naturalizing Power: Essays in Feminist Cultural Analysis.  New York & London: Routledge.  (Pp. 47-64).

4) Scheper-Hughes, Nancy 1997 ≥Lifeboat Ethics: Mother Love and Child Death in Northeast Brazil.≤  In R. N. Lancaster & M. Di Leonardo (Eds.) The Gender/Sexuality Reader: Culture, History, Political Economy.  New York & London: Routledge. (Pp. 82-88).

 

Suggested Readings:

1) Goddard, V. A. 1994  ≥From the Mediterranean to Europe: Honor, Kinship and Gender.≤ In V.A. Goddard, J.R. Llobera & C. Shore (eds.) The Anthropology of Europe. Identities and Boundaries in Conflict. Berg, Oxford and Providence.

2) Luise, Lamphere 1974 ≥Strategies, Cooperation, and Conflict Among Women in Domestic Groups.≤ In Rosaldo & Lamphere.

3)  Yanagisako, S. J. 1991  Capital and Gendered Interest in Italian Family Firms. In D.I. Kertzer & R. P. Saller (Eds.) The Family in Italy from Antiquity to the Present. Yale University Press, London and New Haven.

4)  Collier, Jane, Michelle Z. Rosaldo & Sylvia Yanagisako 1997 ≥Is There a Family? New Anthropological Views.≤ In R. N. Lancaster & M. Di Leonardo (Eds.) The Gender/Sexuality Reader: Culture, History, Political Economy.  New York & London: Routledge.

 

WEEK 10 -- TU 4/9 -- Masculinities: images of manhood. Hegemonic & subaltern masculinities.

 

Readings:

1) From: Connell, R. W. 1995 Masculinities.

            Ch. 1: The Science of Masculinity. Pp. 3-44.

            Ch. 2: Menπs Bodies. Pp. 45-52.

            Ch. 3: The Social Organization of Masculinity. Pp. 67-86.

            Ch. 4: Live Fast and Die Young.  Pp. 93-119.

            Ch. 7: Men of Reason. Pp. 164-181.

            Ch. 8: The History of Masculinity. Pp. 185-203.

            Ch. 9: Masculinity Politics. Pp. 204-224.

 

Suggested Readings:

1)  Gilmore, D. 1990  Manhood in the Making: Cultural Concepts of Masculinity. Yale University Press, New Haven.

2)  Kiesling (to be announced)

 

 

WEEK 11 -- TU 4/16  -- Multiplying genders and sexualities: LGBT new analysis.

 

Readings:

1)  Somerville, Siobhan 1997 ≥Scientific Racism and the Invention of the Homosexual Body.≤ In R. N. Lancaster & M. Di Leonardo (Eds.) The Gender/Sexuality Reader: Culture, History, Political Economy.  New York & London: Routledge. (Pp. 36-48). 

2)  Stein, Arlene  1997 ≥Sisters and Queers: The Decentering of Lesbian Feminism.≤ In R. N. Lancaster & M. Di Leonardo (Eds.) The Gender/Sexuality Reader: Culture, History, Political Economy.  New York & London: Routledge. (Pp. 378-390).

3) Carrier, J. M. 1999  ≥Mexican Male Bisexuality.≤ In M. Storr (Ed.) Bisexuality: A critical Reader.  New York and London: Routledge.  (Pp. 75-86) 

4) Sittitrai, Wiresit, Tim Brown & S. Virulrak 1999 ≥Patterns of Bisexuality in Thailand.≤ In M. Storr (Ed.) Bisexuality: A critical Reader.  New York and London: Routledge. (Pp. 87-99)

5) Butler, J. 1997.  ≥Gender is Burning: Questions of Appropriation and Subversion.≤  In A. McClintock, A. Mufti and E Shohat (eds.), Dangerous Liaisons: Gender, Nation, & Postcolonial Perspectives.  Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press. (Pp. 381-395).

6) Connell, R. W. 1995: Ch. 6, ≥A Very Straight Gay,≤ pp.142-163.

 

 

Suggested Readings:

1) Gayle Rubin 1975 ≥The Traffic in Women: Notes on the Political Economy of Sex.≤ (Pp. 157-210).

2) Hemmings, Clare 1999 ≥Locating Bisexual Identities: Discourses of Bisexuality and Contemporary feminist Theory.≤ In M. Storr (Ed.) Bisexuality: A critical Reader.  New York and London: Routledge.

3)  Weston, Karl 1995 ≥Forever is a Long Time: Romancing the Real in Gay Kinship Ideologies.≤ In S. Yanagisako & C. Delaney (Eds.) Naturalizing Power: Essays in Feminist Cultural Analysis.  New York & London: Routledge.

 

 

WEEK 12 -- TU 4/23 -- Sisterhoods and Hierarchies: Unveiling power hierarchies among women.

 

Readings:

1)  Carby, H. V. 1997.  ≥On the Threshold of Womanπs Era: Lynching, Empire, and Sexuality in Black Feminist Theory.≤  In A. McClintock, A. Mufti and E. Shohat (eds.), Dangerous Liaisons: Gender, Nation, & Postcolonial Perspectives.  Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press. (Pp. 330-342)

2)  hooks, bell 1997 ≥Sisterhood.≤ In A. McClintock, A. Mufti and E. Shohat (eds.), Dangerous Liaisons: Gender, Nation, & Postcolonial Perspectives.  Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press. (Pp. 396-411)

3)  Mohanty, C. T. 1997.  ≥Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses.≤  In A. McClintock, A. Mufti and E Shohat (eds.), Dangerous Liaisons: Gender, Nation, & Postcolonial Perspectives.  Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press. (Pp. 255-274).

 

Suggested Readings:

1)  Goodwin, Marjorie Harness 1998 ≥Games of Stance: Conflict and Footing in Hopscotch.≤ In S. M. Hoyle & C. T. Adger (Eds.) Kids Talk: Strategic Language Use in Late Childhood. New York: Oxford University Press.

2)  Wisweswaran, Kamala 1994  Fictions of Feminist Ethnography. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis & London.

 

 

WEEK 13 -- TU 4/30 Gender and power: non-western womenπs criticism of ≥woman≤. Post-colonial reflections on gender.

 

Readings:

1)  Ong, A. 1988  Colonialism and Modernity: Feminist Re-presentation of Women in Non-Western Societies. Inscriptions. 79-83.

2)  Stoler, Ann 1997 ≥Making Empire Respectable.≤  In A. McClintock, A. Mufti and E Shohat (eds.), Dangerous Liaisons: Gender, Nation, & Postcolonial Perspectives.  Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press. (Pp. 344-367)

3)  Kondo, Dorinne 1997 ≥M. Butterfly: Orientalism, Gender, and a Critique of Essentialist Identity.≤ In About Face: Performing Race in Fashion and Theater. New York & London: Routledge.

4)  Chaudhuri, Nupur and Margaret Strobel 1992 Introduction. In Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. (Pp. 1-12)

5)  Blake, Susan 1992 ≥A Womanπs Trek: What Difference does Gender Make?≤ In Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. (19-32)

6)  Callaway, Helen and Dorothy O. Helly 1992 ≥Crusader for Empire: Flora Shaw/Lady Lugard.≤ In Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. (Pp. 79-94).

 

Suggested Readings:

1)  Hatem, Mervat 1992 Through Each Otherπs Eyes: The Impact on the Colonial encounter of the Images of Egyptian, Levantine-Egyptian, and European Women, 1862-1920. In Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. (Pp. 35-56)

2)  McClintock, Ann 1997 ≥No Longer in Future Heaven: Gender, Race and Nationalism.≤ In A. McClintock, A. Mufti and E Shohat (eds.), Dangerous Liaisons: Gender, Nation, & Postcolonial Perspectives.  Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press.

 

 

WEEK 14 -- TU 5/7 -- Final Reflections.

 

 

FINALSπ WEEK

 

Deadline to turn in the final paper: Saturday May 18 at 2pm

 

Course Policies:

 

Code of honor

The Oberlin College Students' Code of Honor applies to the course.

 

Readings should be completed by the day they are listed on the syllabus; this will help you follow lectures and prepare for discussion.

 

Summaries of the readings should be about 2 pages long. They are due at the beginning of the class session. All summaries should be typed.  Late summaries will be graded down 1 point for each day that they are late.

 

Grades:

Weekly Summaries                  50 points

Presentations                            45 points

Participation                            40 points

Final Paper                               65 points

                                                _________

                                                200 points

 

Final Note: Although the syllabus will be followed as much as possible, it is intended as a guideline and circumstances may require a change to the schedule.  Students are responsible for any changes announced in class.