Women’s and gender studies department challenges mainstream feminism

When first-year Nasya Allen was taught about women’s history before coming to UNC, women who looked like her were often not featured.

White women, she said, were usually the center of that education. 

In a lot of different spaces, Allen said education tends to focus on white women and their accomplishments. Ariana Vigil, women's and gender studies professor and department chair, said  the Department of Women’s and Gender Studies tries to address this lack of representation in classes' curriculum.

“Women of color — nonwhite women — have always been involved in feminist movements, even if their contributions have not always been recognized,” she said. “So that's something we talk about in a historical context as well.”

Vigil said one major topic in the women's and gender studies curriculum is intersectionality, an area of inquiry she explained arose from Black feminist theorists. Intersectionality describes and analyzes the ways systems of oppression can be experienced simultaneously. Areas of overlap can include oppression related to race, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status and gender.     

The concept of intersectionality, Allen said, aligns with her experiences as a Black woman. 

“I think that being a woman is very closely tied to my identity because I'm not just Black and I'm not just a woman, but I am a Black woman,” she said. “And I think that that's a very unique experience that is not necessarily just captured by talking about Black issues or talking about issues about women.”

Students majoring in women's and gender studies are required to take a course from a “minority/third world/non-Western women or gender” perspective. 

Many of the classes offered within the requirement focus on specific groups and overlap with gender-related issues, such as Women's and Gender Studies 211: Introduction to Latina Feminisms: Literature, Theory, and Activism. Several of these concepts are first introduced to students in introductory courses in the department, like Women's and Gender Studies 101: Introduction to Women’s Studies. 

Vigil said the requirement pre-dates her 13 years at UNC and illustrates the department’s long-standing commitment to thinking about gender issues in intersectional ways. 

“Questions of race and ethnicity, I think, permeate our curriculum,” Vigil said. “They're not siloed away, but of course we do also have courses that look in depth at questions pertaining to particularly U.S. women of color within feminist movements.”

When UNC sophomore Mary Esposito took Women's and Gender Studies 140: Introduction to Gay and Lesbian Culture and Literature, she said it was the only time she gained a clear picture of women's history in her education. And as a member of the LGBTQ+ community, she said the course was also one of the few times she learned in-depth about LGBTQ+ representation.

“I would say that the majority of women's history that is talked about today is still catered to be palatable for men,” Esposito said. “What I mean by that is, we are talking about white, Eurocentric, maybe conventionally attractive, heterosexual women in women's history — women that men can find some value in.”

Conversations of representation and diversity span beyond just the women's and gender studies curriculum and to faculty within the department, Vigil said. As a Latina woman and chair of the department, she said working toward a more diverse faculty and bigger department is very important to her, especially when advocating for women of color in leadership roles.

In general, Allen said an important first step is to give more women space to speak about their histories and experiences.

“The biggest thing would just be giving women of color, or just women with different intersectional identities, the space to speak because I think so often we are shut down because we don't fit what everyone thinks when they think of women in America,” she said.

@dailytarheel | university@dailytarheel.com