Conceptualising Gender Studies: Curriculum and Pedagogy

Abstract

This article draws upon the experience of inhabiting the disciplinary space of Gender Studies (GS) as faculty in a newly founded social science and humanities university, Ambedkar University Delhi (AUD). It attempts to formulate the challenges in and potential for giving shape to this specialised discipline in a neo-liberal context. It grapples with some of the complexities of the originary moment and how they have affected the discipline. Issues and linkages with Women’s Studies also foreground some of the tensions that have characterised our brief disciplinary history. These themes are explored by drawing upon the experience of curricular review and design of the Master’s programme in GS and the pedagogical dilemmas that constantly crop up in this age of celebration of ‘difference’. The first section focuses on the larger context of higher education in which a university like AUD was set up along with a discussion of the specific context of the location of GS within AUD. The second section looks at the various transactions and negotiations needed to run the GS programme.