B8083 - Gender and Cultures (1) (LM)

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course, students will have developed an appropriate knowledge base of theories of gender in relation to cultural processes and an understanding of the relevance of gender as a lens to analyse operations of power. In addition, they will have developed a good awareness of methodological issues in the study of gender and space/place and their mutually constitutive nature. The course will equip students with the analytical skills for digesting complex theories and will enable them to put theories to use in engaging with contemporary debates inside and outside of academia. Finally, students will develop appropriate and diverse research and communication skills where theory can be applied in projects outside of the classroom.

Course contents

This course explores the construction and lived realities of gender in its intersection with race, space and place. Exploring “gender” as a fluid, socially and spatially constructed category, the course guides students through the ways that gender, race and space intertwine in theory and in lived experience, both historically and in present times. Taught through interdisciplinary contributions ranging from social, feminist, queer and affect theories – across disciplines such as anthropology, political geography, cultural studies, architecture- the course examines the diverse and interconnected understandings, experiences, and effects of “gender” as a system of meaning-making and power across spaces, places and historical times.

During the first two weeks, we will focus on gender and feminist theories, to introduce students to the main debates and issues, starting from the nature/culture divide through to the contestation and dissolution of gender binaries. Following on that we will further examine the interface between gender theory and a variety of other theoretical perspectives applied to the study of Asia, Africa and the Middle East, including postcolonialism, postmodernism and poststructuralism. The course will also investigate central questions of epistemology and methodology in relation to the application of gender theories in the field of cross-cultural studies

The main focus running through the course will be the body, and body politics. The class will pay particular attention to introducing students to diverse feminist trajectories and embodied politics, including Black feminism, Islamic feminism, feminist liberation movements in the Global south and others.

 

Students with SLD or temporary or permanent disabilities. It is suggested that they get in touch as soon as possible with the relevant University office (https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en) and with the lecturer in order to seek together the most effective strategies for following the lessons and/or preparing for the examination.

Readings/Bibliography

The course themes and syllabus include:

Introduction to the course: From Epstein to genocide

Gender, race and white supremacy

Bong Cook, B. (2023). Jeffrey Epstein: Pedophiles, prosecutors, and power. The Journal of Gender, Race & Justice, 26(2), 313–364.

Sarah Bracke and Luis Manuel Hernández Aguilar, ‘The Politics of Replacement: From “Race Suicide” to the “Great Replacement”’ in Bracke and Hernández Aguilar (eds) The Politics of Replacement: Demographic Fears, Conspiracy Theories, and Race Wars (Abingdon: Routledge, 2023), pp. 1–19.

Slobodian, Q. (2025). Hayek’s bastards: Race, gold, IQ, and the capitalism of the far right. Zone Books. (Introduction)

Historicising contemporary issues: From Naturalising approaches to Gender

Ortner, Sherry (1974) ‘Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture?’, in Michelle Rosaldo & Louise Lamphere (eds.) Woman, Culture & Society. Stanford: Stanford University Press, pp. 67-87.

Moore, Henrietta (1994) ‘The Cultural Constitution of Gender’, inThe Polity Reader in Gender Studies. Cambridge: Polity Press, pp. 14-21.

Connell, R. W. (2002) ‘The Question of Gender’, in Gender. Oxford: Polity, pp. 1-11.

From gender to sex. Queer Theory, Gender and performativity

Butler, J. (1988). Performative acts and gender constitution: An essay in phenomenology and feminist theory. Theatre Journal, 40(4), 519–531. https://doi.org/10.2307/3207893

Butler, J. (1993). Bodies that matter: On the discursive limits of sex. Routledge.

Transfeminism and Gender Critical movements

Bassi and Lafleur (2022) Introduction TERFs, Gender-Critical Movements, and Postfascist Feminism in TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly * Volume 9, Number 3 * August 2022

Koyama, E. (2021). Transfeminism: A collection (pp. 1–18). The Feminist Conspiracy Press.

Patriarchy and its use

Johnston, M., & Meger, S. (2024). Morbid symptoms: a feminist dialectics of global patriarchy in crisis. European Journal of International Relations, 31(3), 1–28.

Fraser, N. (2009). Feminism, capitalism and the cunning of history. New Left Review, (56), 97–117.

Abu-Lughod, L. (2023). Securofeminism: Embracing a phantom. In The cunning of gender violence (pp. 63–89). Duke University Press.

Sexuality as a diagnostic of Colonialism and Empire

Stoler, A. (1995). Race and the Education of Desire. Foucault's history of sexuality and the colonial order of things. Durham and London: Duke University Press.

Colonial and neo-colonial feminism: White men saving brown women from brown men

Spivak, G. C. (1988). Can the subaltern speak? In C. Nelson & L. Grossberg (Eds.), Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture (pp. 271–313). Macmillan Education.

Abu-Lughod, L. (2013). Do Muslim women need saving? Harvard University Press.

Beyond liberal and secular ontologies

Najmabadi, A. (2022). Familial undercurrents: Untold stories of love and marriage in modern Iran. Duke University Press.

Mahmood, S. (2011). Politics of piety: The Islamic revival and the feminist subject (2nd ed.). Princeton University Press.

Homosocial desire and same sex practices: Global south critiques

Massad, J. A. (2007). Desiring Arabs. University of Chicago Press.

Najmabadi, A. (2005). Women with mustaches and men without beards: Gender and sexual anxieties of Iranian modernity. University of California Press.

Najmabadi, A. (2008). Verdict: Not guilty. Journal of Middle East Women's Studies, 4(2), 99–101.

Queer in service of Empire?

Rao, R. (2014). The locations of homophobia. London Review of International Law, 2(2), 169–199. https://doi.org/10.1093/lril/lru010

Puar, J. K. (2013). Rethinking homonationalism. International Journal of Middle East Studies, 45(2), 336–339.

Puar, J. K. (2017). Terrorist assemblages: Homonationalism in queer times (10th anniv. ed.). Duke University Press.

Puar, Jasbir (2008) ‘Feminists and queers in the service of empire’ in Feminism and War: Confronting U.S. Imperialism, ed. by. Robon Riley et al. London & New York: Zed Books, pp. 47-55.

Massad, J. A. (2002). Re-orienting desire: The Gay International and the Arab world. Public Culture, 14(2), 361–385. https://doi.org/10.1215/08992363-14-2-361

Feminism & Intersectionality

hooks, bell (2001) ‘Black Women Shaping Feminist Theory’, in Feminism & Race, ed. by Kum-Kum Bhavnani. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 33-39.

Hill Collins, Patricia (2019) Intersectionality as critical social theory. Part 1 chapter 1: Intersectionality as critical enquiry (page 48-87)

Brah, Avtar and Ann Phoenix (2004) Ain't I A Woman? Revisiting Intersectionality. Journal of International Women’sStudies, Vol 5 #3 May 2004, pp. 75-86.

Nash, J. (2019) Black Feminism Reimagined: After Intersectionality, Duke University Press

Genocide, Settler-Colonialism and War: Indigenous and Radical Feminist critiques

Shoman, H., Ajour, A., Ababneh, S., Jabiri, A., Pratt, N., Repo, J. and Aldossari, M. (2025), Feminist Silences in the Face of Israel's Genocide Against the Palestinian People: A Call for Decolonial Praxis Against Complicity. Gender Work Organ, 32: 1668-1675. https://doi.org/10.1111/gwao.13258

Moreton-Robinson, A. (2020). Talkin’ up to the white woman: Indigenous women and feminism (20th anniv. ed.). University of Queensland Press.

Davis, Angela (2008) ‘A vocabulary for feminist praxis: on war and radical critique’, in Feminism and War: Confronting U.S. Imperialism, ed. by. Robon Riley et al. London & New York: Zed Books, pp. 19-26.

Bhandar, B., & Ziadah, R. (Eds.). (2020). Revolutionary feminisms: Conversations on collective action and radical thought. London: Verso

Bodies, vulnerability and resistance

Butler, J., Gambetti, Z., & Sabsay, L. (Eds.). (2016). Vulnerability in resistance. Duke University Press.

Butler, J. (2016). Rethinking vulnerability in resistance. In J. Butler, Z. Gambetti, & L. Sabsay (Eds.), Vulnerability in resistance (pp. 12–27). Duke University Press.

Tzelepis, E. (2016). Vulnerable corporealities and precarious belongings in Mona Hatoum's art. In J. Butler, Z. Gambetti, & L. Sabsay (Eds.), Vulnerability in resistance (pp. 147–166). Duke University Press.

Puwar, N. (2004). Space invaders: Race, gender and bodies out of place. Bloomsbury Academic.

Gender, Bodies and Death in Palestine

Hamami, R. (2016). Precarious politics: The activism of "bodies that count" (aligning with those that don't) in Palestine's colonial frontier. In J. Butler, Z. Gambetti, & L. Sabsay (Eds.), Vulnerability in resistance (pp. 167–190). Duke University Press.

Daher-Nashif, S. (2021). Colonial management of death: To be or not to be dead in Palestine. Current Sociology, 69(7), 945–963.

Salih, R. (2017). Bodies that walk, bodies that talk, bodies that love: Palestinian women refugees, affectivity, and the politics of the ordinary. Antipode, 49(3), 742–760.

Wahbe, R. M. (2020). The politics of karameh: Palestinian burial rites under the gun. Critique of Anthropology, 40(3), 323–340. https://doi.org/10.1177/0308275X20929401 [https://www.google.com/search?q=https://doi.org/10.1177/0308275X20929401]

Gender and other than human affects: Bodies, Barricades and Statues of and against Empire

Ertür, B. (2016). Barricades: Resources and residues of resistance. In J. Butler, Z. Gambetti, & L. Sabsay (Eds.), Vulnerability in resistance (pp. 97–121). Duke University Press.

Rao, Rahul (2025) The Psychic Lives of Statues: Reckoning with the Rubble of Empire. 1st ed., Pluto Press.

Klinkert, V. L. (2022). Toppled Statues: From Catalysis to Catharsis. Darkmatter Hub (Beta). Retrieved from https://darkmatter-hub.pubpub.org/pub/2mmzmby9

Teaching methods

The course will be organised around weekly topics. Attending students will receive a syllabus with all weekly lectures and activities at the beginning of the course.

Attending students will be expected to be involved in the class activities, with presentations, discussions and group group.

These activities will be in addition to the frontal lectures delivered by the lecturer.

Assessment methods

Attending students: (those who attend at least 75% of the class in person): written exam in classroom.For the exam the students will be asked to choose three out of 10 open ended questions. It is expected that students will carry out the weekly readings assigned and participate actively in class discussions.

Non attending students: The exam will be based on in depth knowledge of :

Beasley, C. (2005). Gender & sexuality: Critical theories, critical thinkers. SAGE Publications Ltd, https://doi.org/10.4135/9781446220498

Kim, Seung-Kyung, and Carole R. McCann. Feminist Theory Reader Local and Global Perspectives. New York and London: Routledge, 2003. Print. (SECTIONS OF)

In addition students will choose a thematic issue and prepare on two journal articles of their choice (from the main list)

Students with SLD or temporary or permanent disabilities. It is necessary to contact the relevant University office (https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en) with ample time in advance: the office will propose some adjustments, which must in any case be submitted 15 days in advance to the lecturer, who will assess the appropriateness of these in relation to the teaching objectives.

Teaching tools

Audiovisuals, blogs, social media content will be used to support the teaching. Visits involving participant observation and walking methods might be utilised. On occasions, there might be some guest lecturers, who might be activists, writers, artists, as well as academics.

Office hours

See the website of Ruba Salih