Students
GEN 210 – Reading Gender in Everyday Life
2012 – D2
General Information
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| Unit convenor and teaching staff |
Unit convenor and teaching staff
Unit Convenor
Emily Cachia
Contact via emily.cachia@mq.edu.au
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| Credit points |
Credit points
3
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| Prerequisites |
Prerequisites
12cp or admission to GDipArts or permission of Executive Dean of Faculty
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| Corequisites |
Corequisites
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| Co-badged status |
Co-badged status
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| Unit description |
Unit description
This unit examines how gender functions in our day-to-day lives. We look closely at common activities like shopping, eating, grooming, talking, reading, going to the movies, using cosmetic surgery, getting married and more, to examine some of the discourses—biological, cultural, social, anthropological—that reproduce ideas of masculinity and femininity, of being a man or woman. We look at intersections of gender with class, ethnicity, and race. We also introduce students to some of the influential ideas on how gender works, theories by European philosophers like Freud and Foucault, as well as essays by feminist activists and post-modern writers on gender and sexuality.
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Important Academic Dates
Information about important academic dates including deadlines for withdrawing from units are available at https://www.mq.edu.au/study/calendar-of-dates
Learning Outcomes
On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
- Understand specifically how the writing of Freud and Foucault has inspired scholars in gender studies.
- Develop a practical sense of how to research a variety of texts in public circulation, how to evaluate their content and engage with it effectively.
- Develop an understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and forms of everyday living. The topics covered will help the student to approach real-life situations, analyse them, and remedy problems when necessary.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment Tasks
| Name | Weighting | Due |
|---|---|---|
| Summaries | 30% | 13th September 2012 |
| Quizzes | 20% | Wednesdays, weeks 2-12 |
| Essay | 40% | 8th November 2012 |
| Participation | 10% | throughout |
Summaries
Due: 13th September 2012
Weighting: 30%
Summaries of one reading by Freud and one reading by Foucault from the choice of
readings in the summary list.
On successful completion you will be able to:
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
- Understand specifically how the writing of Freud and Foucault has inspired scholars in gender studies.
Quizzes
Due: Wednesdays, weeks 2-12
Weighting: 20%
Weekly multiple choice quiz on the required readings of weeks 2-12
On successful completion you will be able to:
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
- Understand specifically how the writing of Freud and Foucault has inspired scholars in gender studies.
- Develop an understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and forms of everyday living. The topics covered will help the student to approach real-life situations, analyse them, and remedy problems when necessary.
Essay
Due: 8th November 2012
Weighting: 40%
Write an analytical essay on one of the questions listed.
On successful completion you will be able to:
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
Participation
Due: throughout
Weighting: 10%
Peer discussion of unit material in tutorial groups and on the GEN210
iLearn site.
On successful completion you will be able to:
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
- Understand specifically how the writing of Freud and Foucault has inspired scholars in gender studies.
- Develop a practical sense of how to research a variety of texts in public circulation, how to evaluate their content and engage with it effectively.
- Develop an understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and forms of everyday living. The topics covered will help the student to approach real-life situations, analyse them, and remedy problems when necessary.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Delivery and Resources
Delivery:
Day and Online.
GEN210 comprises of one 2 hour Lecture and one 1 hour tutorial each week.
Technologies used and required
This unit has an online presence in iLearn (http://ilearn.mq.edu.au). Students require access to the internet and a computer.
This unit will use Echo lecture recording (accessed via iLearn).
Times and Locations for Lectures and Tutorials
For current updates, lecture times and classrooms please consult the MQ Timetables website: http://www.timetables.mq.edu.au
GEN210 Lecture Wednesday W5A T1 9-11am
GEN210 Tutorials Wedneday W6B 157 11-12pm, 12-1pm, 2-3pm, 3-4pm, 5-6pm.
Required and recommended resources
Required readings can be accessed through e-reserve via iLearn. These can be read online, printed out by the student and/or downloaded.
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Week one |
Required Reading Scott, Susie, 2009. ‘What is everyday life?’ (pp.-6) & ‘Theorizing the mundane’ Making sense of everyday life. Cambridge: Polity. Hines, Melissa, 2003. “Engendering the Brain” from her book Brain gender. Oxford; New York, Oxford University Press. Recommended Reading Oudshoorn, Nelly. Beyond the natural body: an archaeology of sex hormones. New York; London, Routledge, 1994. van den Wijngaard, Marianne. Reinventing the sexes: the biomedical construction of femininity and masculinity. Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1997.
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Week two |
Required Reading Bordo, Susan. ‘The Body and the Reproduction of Femininity’ in Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture, and the Body. University of California Press 2004. Haber, Honi Fern. “Foucault Pumped: Body Politics and the Muscled Woman” inFeminist interpretations of Michel Foucault, edited by Susan J. Hekman. University Park, Pa., Pennsylvania State University Press, 1996. Recommended Reading Holmes, Mary, 2009. ‘Learning and doing gender in everyday life’, Gender and everyday life. London; New York: Routledge,.
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Week three |
Required Reading Moi, Toril. “Jealousy and Sexual Difference”, Feminist Review, 11, 1982, 53-69 Yates, Candida. "Masculinity and Good Enough Jealousy ', Psychoanalytic Studies, Vol. 2, No.1, 2000. Recommended Reading Freud, S. "Some neurotic mechanisms in jealousy, paranoia and homosexuality', Penguin Freud Library 10, Penguin Books, 1922, pp. 195-208. Friday, Nancy. “Be a Man!” in Jealousy. M. Evans and Company, Inc., 1997, pp. 295-353. Minsky, Ros. “Psychoanalysis and Gender” in Theorizing gender ed. Rachel Alsop, A. Fitzsimons and K. Lennon. Malden, MA : Blackwell, 2002.
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Week four |
Required Reading Bronfen, Elisabeth, 1998. Medicine's Hysteria Romance: Is It History or Legend? The knotted subject: hysteria and its discontents. Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press. Micale, Mark S. 2008 Male hysteria at the fin de siècle Hysterical men: the hidden history of male nervous illness.Cambridge, Mass.; London: Harvard University Press. Recommended Reading Foucault, Michel (trans Robert Hurley) (1981) The History of Sexuality, Volume One, Pelican, Harmondsworth, pp.103-107. Mitchell, Juliet. Mad Men and Medusas: reclaiming hysteria and the effect of sibling relations on the human condition. London: Penguin, 2000, pp. 8-19
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Week five |
Required Reading Haiken, Elizabeth. “Consumer Culture and the Inferiority Complex” from her Venus envy: a history of cosmetic surgery. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins UP, 1997. Heyes, Cressida J.,2009. "All Cosmetic Surgery is Ethnic: Asian Eyelids, Feminist Indignation, and the Politics of Whiteness." In Cressida J. Heyes and Meredith Jones, ed. Cosmetic Surgery: A Feminist Primer Aldershot, UK: Ashgate.
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Week six |
Required Reading Kingston, Anne. Ch. 1. ‘The Wife Gap’ in The Meaning of Wife. New York. Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2005. Boden, Sharon. Consuming pleasure on the wedding day: the lived experience of being a bride in Gender and consumption: domestic cultures and the commercialisation of everyday life, ed. Casey, E. & Martens, L. Aldershot; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007. Recommended Reading Geller, Jaclyn, ‘An Angel in White: the Wedding Dress’ in Here comes the bride: women, weddings, and the marriage mystique; Four Walls Eight Windows, New York, c2001. |
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Week seven |
Required Reading Scott, Susie, 2009. ‘Shopping’. Making sense of everyday life. Cambridge: Polity. Camhi, Leslie, 1993 Stealing Femininity: Department Store Kleptomania as Sexual Disorder. Differences vol. 5, no. 1. Recommended Reading Spark, Penny. “‘A Kind of Golden Age’: Goods and Femininity”, in As Long As it’s Pink: The Sexual Politics of Taste, Pandora Press, 1995. Minsky, Rosalind, “Consumer ‘Goods’” in Serious Shopping: Essays in Psychotherapy and Consumerism ed. Adrienne Baker. Free Association Books, 2000.
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Week eight |
Required Readings Counihan, Carole M. “Food, Culture and Gender” in The anthropology of food and body: gender, meaning, and power. New York; London, Routledge, 1999. Joan Smith, excerpt from ‘Sexing the Cherry’, in Hungry for You. From Cannibalism to Seduction: A Book of Food, Chatto & Windus, 1996, pp. 83-87; 91-93;103. Recommended Readings Adams, Carol J. The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory. Continuum, 1995. Scott, Susie, 2009. Eating and drinking. Making sense of everyday life. Cambridge: Polity. Sheridan, Susan. “Eating the Other: Food and Cultural Difference in the Australian Women's Weekly in the 1960s” in the Journal of Intercultural Studies, Dec 2000, vol. 21, no. 3, pp. 319-329
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Week nine |
Required Reading Balsamo, Anne (1997) “Public Pregnancies and Cultural Narratives of Surveillance”, chapter 4 of Technologies of the Gendered Body: reading cyborg women, Durham, Duke University Press, 1996. Keane, Helen. "The Toxic Womb: Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, Alcoholism and the Female Body" in Australian Feminist Studies, vol. 11, no. 24, 1996.
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Week ten |
Required readings: Rand, Erica, “Older Heads on Younger Bodies”, ch. 2 of her Barbie’s Queer Accessories. Durham and London, Duke University Press, 1995. & Rogers, Mary F. “Plastic Selves”, chapter 6 from her Barbie culture London, Sage Publications, 1999.
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Week eleven |
Required Reading Joan Riviere, (1929/1986) “Womanliness as a Masquerade”, in Formations of Fantasy, eds. Victor Burgin, James Donald, Cora Kaplan, Methuen. Peiss, Kathy. “Making Up, Making Over: Cosmetics, Consumer Culture, and Women's Identity” in The sex of things: gender and consumption in historical perspective, edited by Victoria de Grazia. Berkeley, Uni. of California Press, c1996 Recommended reading Tannen, Ricki Stefanie. The female trickster: the mask that reveals : post-Jungian and postmodern psychological perspectives on women in contemporary culture. London; New York: Routledge, c2007.
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Week twelve |
Required Reading Van Lenning, Alkeline, Saskia Maas and Wendy Leeks. “Is Womanliness Nothing But a Masquerade? An analysis of The Crying Game" in Masquerade and identities: essays on gender, sexuality and marginality, ed. Efrat Tseëlon. London, Routledge, 2001. Chanter, Tina, 2008 ‘Abject Identifications in The Crying Game: The Mutual Implication of Transgender/Race/ Nationalism/ Class’ in The picture of abjection: film, fetish, and the nature of difference by Tina Chanter. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
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FEEDBACK
Feedback and unit evaluation
The Faculty of Arts values student feedback and seeks to continually improve its teaching. At present, the Faculty collects student feedback in two ways:
1. Anonymous evaluation surveys which are disseminated at the completion of each unit. 2. Student feedback meetings which are held twice a year in the Faculty of Arts. These
meetings are advertised on campus and all students are encouraged to attend.
What has changed based on student feedback
Based on feedback obtained from past students, this unit has been adapted in the following way(s):
Lectures are now delivered in powerpoint form and made available through iLearn, on the request of students in previous years.
The unit was changed from a 4 credit point to a 3 credit point one in 2010, as a university requirement. One assessment piece was dropped. A 2011 a further assessment piece (the web cruise, with limited learning outcomes and now made redundant wit wiki type assessments) will be swapped for weekly quizzes on the readings, which has proved popular in GEN110.
Unit Schedule
2012 LECTURE PROGRAM AND LECTURE/TUTORIAL READINGS
The tutorials run one week after the lectures. The readings listed will be discussed in both lectures and tutorials. Required reading is directly addressed in tutorial discussion. The required readings will be accessible via e-reserve.
Attendance
Attendance at tutorials by internal students is required for a satisfactory participation mark. Attendance at lectures by internal students is also necessary (especially for AV material), students can be given permission to listen to ECHO recordings in lieu of attending lectures only with permission of the convenor.
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Week |
Reading Gender in Everyday Life - Lecture topics |
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Week 1 |
Sex, the brain and hormones |
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Week 2 |
Female body building and sexual difference |
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Week 3 |
Psychoanalysis: stalking, jealousy and sexual difference |
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Week 4 |
Post-structuralism: Madness, history and gender |
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Week 5 |
Cosmetic surgery and the plastic body |
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Week 6 |
Weddings: the body of emotion and spectacle |
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Week 7 |
Shopping, pleasure, anxiety and sexual difference |
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Week 8 |
Food, culture and sexual difference |
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Week 9 |
Drug taking in pregnancy – gender and surveillance |
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Week 10 |
Barbie dolls, gender and the body |
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Week 11 |
Make-up, masking and the performance of femininity |
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Week 12 |
The Crying Game: transforming sex and gender |
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Week 13 |
No lecture – consultation if required |
Learning and Teaching Activities
Week 1
Week 2
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5
Week 6
Week 7
Week 8
Week 9
Week 10
Week 11
Week 12
Week 13
Policies and Procedures
Macquarie University policies and procedures are accessible from Policy Central. Students should be aware of the following policies in particular with regard to Learning and Teaching:
Academic Honesty Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/academic_honesty/policy.html
Assessment Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/assessment/policy.html
Grade Appeal Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/gradeappeal/policy.html
Special Consideration Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/special_consideration/policy.html
In addition, a number of other policies can be found in the Learning and Teaching Category of Policy Central.
Student Support
Macquarie University provides a range of Academic Student Support Services. Details of these services can be accessed at: http://students.mq.edu.au/support/.
UniWISE provides:
- Online learning resources and academic skills workshops http://www.mq.edu.au/learning_skills/
- Personal assistance with your learning & study related questions.
- The Learning Help Desk is located in the Library foyer (level 2).
- Online and on-campus orientation events run by Mentors@Macquarie.
Student Services and Support
Students with a disability are encouraged to contact the Disability Support Unit who can provide appropriate help with any issues that arise during their studies.
Student Enquiries
Details of these services can be accessed at http://www.student.mq.edu.au/ses/.
IT Help
If you wish to receive IT help, we would be glad to assist you at http://informatics.mq.edu.au/help/.
When using the university's IT, you must adhere to the Acceptable Use Policy. The policy applies to all who connect to the MQ network including students and it outlines what can be done.
Graduate Capabilities
Capable of Professional and Personal Judgement and Initiative
We want our graduates to have emotional intelligence and sound interpersonal skills and to demonstrate discernment and common sense in their professional and personal judgement. They will exercise initiative as needed. They will be capable of risk assessment, and be able to handle ambiguity and complexity, enabling them to be adaptable in diverse and changing environments.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Develop a practical sense of how to research a variety of texts in public circulation, how to evaluate their content and engage with it effectively.
- Develop an understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and forms of everyday living. The topics covered will help the student to approach real-life situations, analyse them, and remedy problems when necessary.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment tasks
- Essay
- Participation
Commitment to Continuous Learning
Our graduates will have enquiring minds and a literate curiosity which will lead them to pursue knowledge for its own sake. They will continue to pursue learning in their careers and as they participate in the world. They will be capable of reflecting on their experiences and relationships with others and the environment, learning from them, and growing - personally, professionally and socially.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
Assessment tasks
- Quizzes
- Essay
- Participation
Discipline Specific Knowledge and Skills
Our graduates will take with them the intellectual development, depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content in their chosen fields to make them competent and confident in their subject or profession. They will be able to demonstrate, where relevant, professional technical competence and meet professional standards. They will be able to articulate the structure of knowledge of their discipline, be able to adapt discipline-specific knowledge to novel situations, and be able to contribute from their discipline to inter-disciplinary solutions to problems.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
- Understand specifically how the writing of Freud and Foucault has inspired scholars in gender studies.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment tasks
- Summaries
- Quizzes
- Essay
- Participation
Critical, Analytical and Integrative Thinking
We want our graduates to be capable of reasoning, questioning and analysing, and to integrate and synthesise learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments; to be able to critique constraints, assumptions and limitations; to be able to think independently and systemically in relation to scholarly activity, in the workplace, and in the world. We want them to have a level of scientific and information technology literacy.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
- Understand specifically how the writing of Freud and Foucault has inspired scholars in gender studies.
- Develop a practical sense of how to research a variety of texts in public circulation, how to evaluate their content and engage with it effectively.
- Develop an understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and forms of everyday living. The topics covered will help the student to approach real-life situations, analyse them, and remedy problems when necessary.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment tasks
- Summaries
- Essay
- Participation
Problem Solving and Research Capability
Our graduates should be capable of researching; of analysing, and interpreting and assessing data and information in various forms; of drawing connections across fields of knowledge; and they should be able to relate their knowledge to complex situations at work or in the world, in order to diagnose and solve problems. We want them to have the confidence to take the initiative in doing so, within an awareness of their own limitations.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Develop a practical sense of how to research a variety of texts in public circulation, how to evaluate their content and engage with it effectively.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment tasks
- Quizzes
- Essay
- Participation
Creative and Innovative
Our graduates will also be capable of creative thinking and of creating knowledge. They will be imaginative and open to experience and capable of innovation at work and in the community. We want them to be engaged in applying their critical, creative thinking.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Develop a practical sense of how to research a variety of texts in public circulation, how to evaluate their content and engage with it effectively.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment tasks
- Essay
- Participation
Effective Communication
We want to develop in our students the ability to communicate and convey their views in forms effective with different audiences. We want our graduates to take with them the capability to read, listen, question, gather and evaluate information resources in a variety of formats, assess, write clearly, speak effectively, and to use visual communication and communication technologies as appropriate.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Develop a practical sense of how to research a variety of texts in public circulation, how to evaluate their content and engage with it effectively.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment tasks
- Summaries
- Essay
- Participation
Engaged and Ethical Local and Global citizens
As local citizens our graduates will be aware of indigenous perspectives and of the nation's historical context. They will be engaged with the challenges of contemporary society and with knowledge and ideas. We want our graduates to have respect for diversity, to be open-minded, sensitive to others and inclusive, and to be open to other cultures and perspectives: they should have a level of cultural literacy. Our graduates should be aware of disadvantage and social justice, and be willing to participate to help create a wiser and better society.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Understand the ways in which gender is significant in everyday life
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
- Develop an understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and forms of everyday living. The topics covered will help the student to approach real-life situations, analyse them, and remedy problems when necessary.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment tasks
- Essay
- Participation
Socially and Environmentally Active and Responsible
We want our graduates to be aware of and have respect for self and others; to be able to work with others as a leader and a team player; to have a sense of connectedness with others and country; and to have a sense of mutual obligation. Our graduates should be informed and active participants in moving society towards sustainability.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Understand what gender studies is about, why it has developed and why it matters today
- Develop a sense of the complexity and significance of a number of key cultural issues and debates (local and global) in contemporary gender studies
- Develop a practical sense of how to research a variety of texts in public circulation, how to evaluate their content and engage with it effectively.
- Develop an understanding of the relationship between forms of knowledge and forms of everyday living. The topics covered will help the student to approach real-life situations, analyse them, and remedy problems when necessary.
- Share information and debate ideas with peers. The material in this unit raises questions about everyday life, and by coming to grips with it, we expect that the student will have a stronger sense both of who they are and where they come from, and how others from very different backgrounds and situations view the world.
Assessment task
- Participation
Changes since First Published
| Date | Description |
|---|---|
| 20/07/2012 | Technical Team has corrected bug regarding the numbering of Learning Outcomes. |
| 13/07/2012 | The Description and Prerequisites were updated. |
| 30/01/2012 | The Description was updated. |
| 30/01/2012 | The Description was updated. |