The Resident Director for Spring 2006 is:
Mire Koikari
UHM Women's Studies Program
Professor Koikari will be offering the two courses below. Students must take at least one of these.
WS 351: Women, Ideas and Society (3 Credits)
Course Objectives:
In this course, we will analyze how ideas about proper femininity are constructed, consumed, and contested in British culture by examining four major female figures - Queen Victoria, Princess Diana, Sara Ferguson, and Lady Rebecca Rolfe (aka Pocahontas). Examining these iconic figures will present a rich and fascinating opportunity to analyze gender, power, and agency and to observe varied and complex negotiations between dominant cultural institutions and female “celebrities.” We will observe how these women participated in but also resisted against social, cultural, and political expectations imposed on them, and how the debates and controversies surrounding them reveal the socially contested nature of gender, but also much about British racial and national identities. Reading and lecture materials are selected to encourage students to think critically about the gendered, raced, and classed nature of British national body, identity and culture. The course will take advantage of the program’s location in London and involve two field trips (the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Kensington Palace). Click here for more information.
WS 362: Sociology of Gender (3 Credits)
Course Objectives:
In this course, we will examine the processes of British nation- and empire-building with a focus on gender and race. During the semester, we will consider the following questions: What role did women, especially feminists, play in British nation- and empire-building?; In what ways did gender, race, class, and sexuality matter in British imperial culture?; What cultural resources and institutions were and are mobilized in constructing and maintaining the notion of proper national subjects?; How did the Asia-Pacific region (including Hawaii) configure in British imperial culture, imagination, and politics? Reading and lecture materials are selected to encourage students to think about the issues of empire, culture, and women from diverse perspectives, including feminist studies, post-colonial studies, and cultural studies. There will be four “field trips” (British Museum; Victoria and Albert Museum; National Portrait Gallery; Imperial War Museum) which are designed to help students take advantage of the program’s location in London and learn about British imperial history and culture in a concrete and situated manner. Click here for more information.
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