This course is an exploration of different approaches historians have taken since the 1970s to three related fields:
- women's history - that is, uncovering the history of women, who were left out of a history traditionally understood as being about the actions of men;
- feminist history, or thinking about history as a feminist project;
- and gender history, which deals with gender as a category of historical analysis and as something that changes over time.
We will read historical case studies alongside feminist theory and reflections from historians on their methods, to better understand the tools available to historians and the contexts that they came from. We will also engage with a variety of primary source materials. Readings will cover a variety of themes, including histories of social and political movements, imperialism, migration, sexuality and everyday life.
Some of the questions this course takes up are: How have historians dealt with how gender intersects with race, class, sexuality and other social structures? What does it mean to talk about 'women's history' while recognising differences between women? What sources and archives can be used to find traces of people who have been written out of history? How does looking for women and thinking about gender change our understanding of the past?
- Kursleiter*in: Louise Thatcher