Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe

Faculty Director

Iveta Jusová, Director of Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe and Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies, Carleton College

ijusova@carleton.edu

Professor Iveta Jusová (ijusova@carleton.edu) received her Ph.D. in British literature and Cultural Studies from Miami University, Oxford, OH, in 2000. Her MA in Czech and English is from Palacky University, Olomouc, the Czech Republic. Her first book, The New Woman and the Empire (Ohio State University Press, 2005), explores the intersections of gender, race, and colonial issues in the work of four British New Women writers: Sarah Grand, George Egerton, Elizabeth Robins, and Amy Levy. Her second book, Czech Feminisms: Perspectives on Gender in East Central Europe, co-edited with Jirina Siklová, was awarded the 2017 Heldt Prize for best book in Slavic, Eastern European, and Eurasian women’s and gender studies.

Iveta has also published numerous articles on European women writers, actresses and filmmakers in both US and European academic journals. In June 2015 Jusová was the Lawrence and Lee Visiting Research Scholar at OSU’s Theatre Research Institute; in 2010 she was the Women’s History Month Keynote Speaker at Beacon College; and in 2008 she was an invited participant in a panel discussion on (and with) Julia Kristeva as part of the Dagmar and Václav Havel “Vize” Annual Award Ceremony in Prague. Professor Jusová has taught courses in British and world literatures, global feminisms, feminist and queer theory, and feminist methodology.

The Faculty Director conducts the orientation session, leads seminars, facilitates discussion, guides the independent research projects, and evaluates students’ work.

Assistant Director

AJ Al-Kurdi (he/him) is a Ph.D. candidate in Ethnic Studies at UC Berkeley with a Designated Emphasis in Women, Gender, and Sexuality. Building on his former training in International Relations and European Law, his dissertation examines how the self-organization of racialized LGBTQI communities in Europe—specifically Romani, pan-African, and Muslim queer collectives—shapes public policy and legislation at both national and EU levels. Based on fieldwork in Hungary, France, and Germany, his research explores how intersectional politics rooted in U.S. progressive movements travel, adapt, and contest mainstream LGBTQI movement and state discourses around race, gender, and sexuality in Europe.

AJ will serve as the 2025 program Assistant Director and the primary instructor for POSC 243: Socio-Political Systems and Gender Issues Across Europe. He will also supervise student independent research projects.

Sample Independent Research Projects

Students participating in Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe enroll in the four required courses, earning the equivalent of 16 semester credits upon successful completion. Course credits are awarded in Carleton College academic credits. The student’s home institution is responsible for converting the Carleton credits. 

POSC 243: Socio-Political Systems and Gender Issues Across Europe

POSC 243: Socio-Political Systems and Gender Issues Across Europe will replace GWSS 243: Situated Feminisms: Socio-Political Systems and Gender Issues Across Europe in Fall 2025.

This course examines the role of activism centered on gender, race, sexuality, and disability in shaping political life across the Netherlands, Germany, and the Czech Republic. While the main emphasis is on current activism and politics, discussions are anchored in relevant historical contexts. Students investigate the impact of Europe’s colonial heritage on minorities, the ongoing legacies of World War II, the Cold War, and the EU expansion into Eastern Europe. Topics include reproductive rights, LGBT politics, homonationalism, “anti-genderism,” sex work, immigration, challenges faced by women of color and Jewish people in Europe, the legacy of state socialism in Eastern Europe.

GWSS 325/225: Gender and the Biopolitics of Health across Europe

This course investigates the concept of biopolitics and applies intersectional feminist theories to examine how European states control the biological aspects of human life, including birth, health, mortality, and sexuality. It examines how health serves as a domain of power, shaping the lives and well-being of individuals and populations while reinforcing disparities based on race, class, gender, sexuality, and disability. Analyzing the biopolitics of health across different Western and East Central European political systems, case studies include medicalized childbirth, forced sterilization, immigration policies, and LGBT rights. Critical theories of gender, sexuality, and race are central to the course’s analysis.

Note for students about prerequisites: This course is offered at both the 200 and 300 levels; coursework will be adjusted accordingly. Students register either for GWSS 225 or GWSS 325. Those who have not taken a previous Gender Studies course should register for GWSS 225, unless they obtain permission from the instructor. Students who have completed a 100- or 200- level Gender studies course, may choose to register for either GWSS 325 or GWSS 225.

GWSS 244: The Ethics and Politics of Cross-cultural Research

This course explores the following questions: What are the ethics and politics of cross-cultural research? What is the relationship between methodology and knowledge claims in feminist research? What are the power interests involved in keeping certain knowledges marginalized/subjugated? How do questions of gender and sexuality, of ethnicity and national location, figure in these debates? We will also pay close attention to questions arising from the hegemony of English as the global language of WGS as a discipline, and will reflect on what it means to move between different linguistic communities, with each being differently situated in the global power hierarchies.

GWSS 391: Independent Field Research in Europe

This is a self-designed project, and the topic will be determined by each student’s research interests.  It will build on readings and work by European women and/or sexual minorities, feminist & queer theory, cross-cultural theory and (if applicable) principles of field research. It should be cross-cultural and comparative, and ideally should involve field work. Drawing on skills developed in feminist theory and methodology seminars, students select appropriate research methods and conduct sustained research in two of the countries visited. The progress of each project will be evaluated regularly in relation to parameters established in conjunction with the Program Director.

Carleton Teaching Assistant and Resident Adviser

sinhaa2@carleton.edu

Annanya Sinha earned her B.A. from Carleton College in 2025, with double majors in Psychology and Gender, Women’s, and Sexuality Studies (Distinction). For her GWSS senior thesis, Beyond Hijra: Politics of Respectability, Identity, and Mythmaking in Kolkata’s Transgender Communities, she conducted a two-year ethnographic research project across India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia. Supported by the Allen & Irene G. Salisbury Fellowship and the Roy F. Grow Fellowship, she interviewed over 120 participants to examine how trans and queer people in the Global South negotiate social respectability, religious belonging, and cultural narratives of gender, resulting in both an academic manuscript and the documentary focusing exclusively into the the lives of Trans/Hijra* folk in Kolkata, India.

Annanya has also served as a Judicial Intern at the Juvenile Justice Center, a Government Relations Intern at the Smithsonian Institution, and a student researcher in the Perception Psychology Lab and at the Humanities Center at Carleton College. She completed the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School’s Global Institute for Human Rights, training in refugee rights advocacy and United Nations human rights mechanisms. Her academic interests include visual storytelling, transnational feminist theory, cultural psychology, and the intersections of gender and law.

Instructors

Local instructors will share responsibility for teaching GWSS 243: Situated Feminisms: Socio-Political Systems and Gender Issues Across Europe, and assisting with the independent student projects.

Dr. Alvaro Lopez is a sociocultural analyst and researcher, as well as a scientific editor in a number of academic journals, with a PhD from the University of Amsterdam. His fields are psychosocial studies, gender and post/decolonial studies, media and communication, and the study of global transformations, among others. Alvaro’s research focuses on the shifting relationship between the media and contemporary transformations on the global landscape. Alvaro has also been a lecturer in Media Studies (University of Amsterdam), a lecturer in Media, Gender, and Postcolonial Studies (Utrecht University), and the inter-university course coordinator of Social Innovation in the Global Challenges for Sustainability master’s program (Utrecht University, University of Montpellier, University of Barcelona, Trinity College Dublin, ELTE Budapest).

Dr. Blanka Nyklová holds a PhD in sociology from the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University (Prague). She has worked as a researcher at the Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences since 2014. Her research interests include the Czech feminist scene, gender studies in the Czech Republic: notably issues connected with gender-based violence (GBV), and the geopolitical dimension of knowledge production. She specializes in qualitative research and has collaborated on numerous research projects and inter-institutional research into the effects of covid-19 on intimate partner violence. She served as the vice-chairperson of the Gender Expert Chamber of the Czech Republic, and is the president of the Centre for Study of Popular Culture.

Program Structure

Following an orientation to the program, WGSE participants begin a comparative study of Women’s and Gender Studies topics and issues in Utrecht/Amsterdam, Berlin, and Prague. Students come face to face with leading theories in WGS and have the opportunity to test their knowledge while working on their independent research projects. Participants attend lectures and take seminars with Director Iveta Jusová, PhD, as well as with NGOs, artists, activists, and professors from affiliated European universities, including Utrecht University, Humboldt University, Charles University, and Jagiellonian University.

Weekend excursions take students to the Texel Island (Netherlands), the Bad Saarow thermal mineral spa (Germany), and to Olomouc and Javoricske caverns in Moravia (the Czech Republic).

Accommodations and Meals

Students stay in private apartments, student dorms and home-stays throughout Europe. Specific accommodations will be detailed in information packets sent prior to students’ departure for the program. Typically, accommodations include the following: private apartments in Utrecht and Prague; home-stays in Berlin; and student dorms in Olomouc.

Students are given a stipend to purchase their own meals. They can eat out or purchase groceries to cook (in most accommodations). Because students often select their own places to eat, we can accommodate most diets.

Applications for Fall 2026 are open! The rolling admission process begins in mid-February. Please fill out the Connect with Carleton GEP form or email global@carleton.edu to have your name added to the interest list for Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe Fall 2026.

Program Dates for Fall 2026

Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe runs every fall from mid-August to mid-November. The tentative program dates for Fall 2026 are below.

2026 Tentative Program Dates: August 20 – November 17, 2026 (90 days)

• Thursday, August 20: students arrive in Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Friday, Aug 21-Sat, Aug 22: orientation in Utrecht, Netherlands
• Monday, Aug 24: Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe classes and ISPs begin
• Mon, Aug 24-Fri, Aug 28: NOISE workshop, Netherlands Research School of Gender Studies
• Sunday, Sept 13: travel to Berlin, Germany
• Sunday, Oct 11: travel to Prague, Czech Republic
• Thurs, Nov 5-Sat, Nov 7: weekend trip to Olomouc, Czech Republic
• Friday, Nov 13: Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe classes and ISPs end
• Monday, Nov 16: All student academic work, including ISP work, submitted
• Tuesday, Nov 17: students depart from Prague, Czech Republic

Tuition and Program Fees

The Fall 2026 tuition and fees will be available on November 7, 2025.

* Other:

• CISI Emergency Medical Insurance during program dates
• International Student ID card
• Inter-country travel included on the program itinerary

Students are responsible for books and research materials, passport and visa fees (when applicable), transportation to and from Europe, and personal expenses.