Should Women Receive a Separate Education?

Abstract

LTHOUGH IN THEORY most university courses deal with material that concerns both male and female students, most universities also have specific programs in Like American studies, peace studies, black studies, and now ethnic studies, the women's studies programs came into being primarily as a result of the civil rights movement in the late sixties. But even though these programs were created for political purposes, there are other more subtle but nonetheless significant reasons for their continuing existence and popularity. Today I'll try to concentrate on the educational aspects of women's studies: what purpose other than political do their curricula serve? Most of these programs consist of one or two survey courses, supplemented by courses about women from a variety of humanistic and social science disciplines, not necessarily or even usually offered by members of the faculty who specialize in women's studies. Thus inevitably the women's studies curriculum lacks the structure of scientific or linguistic disciplines, where knowledge generally has to be imparted in a predictable sequence; in many cases, the student herself must determine the focus and structure of studies within the program. I speak of the concentrator in women's studies as a her not simply to be even-handed. At least in my experience, most of the majors in and takers of women's studies have been women, just as the majority of students in black studies programs are black. Clearly these students want to learn about themselves, and their culture. But the courses also let them feel, perhaps for the first time in their lives, that they have an advantage over the minority takers of those courses (that is, males), simply because they are what they are by nature, female. Thus women's studies programs allow women to get together to discuss common interests and concerns. Sometimes these programs are linked with women's centers; at the very least they provide a physical meeting place, usually somewhat informal and homey in aspect. But since women's studies programs also exist at women's colleges, like Bryn Mawr and Wellesley, they New Literary History, 1990, 21: 799-815