WOST 402 - Women’s Bodies and Health

Units: 3 ; Breadth Area: Diversity
Interdisciplinary course focusing on women’s body and health experiences, with foci on sexuality, appearance, body control, reproduction, and health/illness. Social, political, and economic perspectives on current health status and health needs of women in the United States.

Prerequisites: Junior, senior or post-baccalaureate standing.
Possible Instructional Methods: Entirely On-ground, or Entirely Online, or Hybrid.
Grading: A-F or CR/NC (student choice).
Breadth Area(s) Satisfied: Overlay - Diversity
Course Typically Offered: Spring ONLY

Student Learning Outcomes - Upon successful completion of this course students will be able to:

Analyze research and case studies related to: 1) women’s health care; 2) women’s health statuses; 3) women’s health experiences; 4) women’s bodies; and, 5) women’s embodied experiences. Readings will include historical and contemporary analyses, and will examine how race, class & gender shape women’s experienced in myriad ways.
Identify and examine historical and contemporary research related to women’s health and bodies. Examine health policies in US and how they have changed over time, paying particular attention to the malleable relationship between the medical field and women’s healthcare self-determination. Contrast US and international health care policies, focusing on 1) health related policies and laws and 2) state funding for women’s health care.
Discuss theoretical and empirical studies related to intersectionality and health/ bodies. Examine how race, class, and gender shape women’s healthcare experiences, paying particular attention to healthcare access, diagnosis rates, treatment options, mortality rates, and follow-up care. Examine how race, gender, sexual orientation and class work together to shape sociocultural expectations for body evaluations and individuals’ body performances.
Read and analyze narratives of multiple women who navigated similar health issues (for instance, breast cancer). Examine how race, class, sexual orientation, citizenship status affected the women’s health care experiences.

Diversity Overlay Learning Outcomes

describe the histories and/or experiences of one or more U. S. cultural groups and the resilience and agency of group members;
identify structures of oppression and the diverse efforts and strategies used by groups to combat the effects of oppressive structures;
analyze the intersection of the categories of race and gender as they affect cultural group members’ lived realities and/or as they are embodied in personal and collective identities;
recognize the way that multiple differences (including, for example, gender, class, sexuality, religion, disability, immigration status, gender expression, color/phenotype, racial mixture, linguistic expression, and/or age) within cultural groups complicate individual and group identities.