[This is a certified Communication-intensive (CI) Course which meets all of the requirements endorsed by HKU’s Senate, including (i) the teaching assessment of written and visual communication ‘literacies’; and (ii) at least 40% of the course grade is assigned to communication-rich assessment tasks.]

Course Description

Should women get married or stay single? Are women natural homemakers? Is it wrong for women to enjoy sex? Should women be given access to birth control and the right to abort? How should women confront sexual violence? What are the opportunities and challenges facing lesbians and transgender women? How do women fight?

During the course we engage in the big debates about women’s livelihood across time, space and culture. To what extent have social expectations for women changed throughout history? How have these expectations been enforced and resisted by women? What do women think about themselves today?

Rethinking Women focuses on contemporary societies through the critical lens of the past. It explores the great strides that women have made in educational and professional achievement in recent decades. But it also explores the social expectations and gender stereotypes that continue to limit women’s capacity to develop their abilities and make life choices. The aim is to encourage students from diverse backgrounds to rethink and challenge the assumptions about women’s identities and experiences. In Rethinking Women we discuss a wide range of material, including texts, films and adverts in order to consider such issues as gender relations, sexuality and reproductive rights, through facilitating a dialogue between the sexes. The course presupposes no previous knowledge of the subject.

Course Learning Outcomes

On completing the course, students will be able to:

1. Explain the social and cultural construction of gender stereotypes at different historical points.
2. Analyze the consequences of such constructions on women’s status and input.
3. Examine the big debates about women’s livelihood at different times and in different global contexts.
4. Assess how the historiography relates to women’s position today.

Offer Semester and Day of Teaching

Second semester (Wed)