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 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.

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 is the relationship between methodology and knowledge claims in feminist research? How do language and narrative help shape experience? 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

The Teaching Assistant and Resident Adviser for Fall 2025 will be announced in the spring.

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.

Amira Fretz is lecturer in the Humanities and Social & Behavioral Sciences at Erasmus University College (EUC) in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. She studied Gender Studies (research MA, cum laude) and International Law (LL.M, cum laude) at Utrecht University, where she frequently collaborates with the Graduate Gender Program. At EUC she teaches interdisciplinary courses in gender studies, political science, and law across two departments. Amira’s own research centers queer theory and queer of color critique; the bodies that are created and/or undone by international human rights law; as well as the construction and livability of queer Arab subjectivities.

Dr. Katrin Frisch studied English and Gender Studies. She holds a PhD in English Literature with a thesis on the interdependencies of right-wing ideology and Modernism, jointly awarded by Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and King’s College London. After her PhD she worked at the Center for Transdisciplinary Gender Studies (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin), before joining the German Research Ombudsman in 2020. In the past years, she has also worked as a lecturer at both Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin as well as Universität Postdam and published numerous articles. Her research and teaching covers topics such as ideology in literature, negotiations of class identity and human-animal studies.

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 the Fall 2025 will open in early November 2024. 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 Buddhist Studies in India Fall 2025.

Program Dates for Fall 2025

Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe runs every fall from mid-August to mid-November. The tentative program dates for Fall 2025 are below.

2025 Tentative Program Dates: August 21 – November 18, 2025 (90 days)

• Thursday, August 21: students arrive in Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Friday, Aug 22-Sat, Aug 23: orientation in Utrecht, Netherlands
• Monday, Aug 25: Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe classes and ISPs begin
• Mon, Aug 25-Fri, Aug 29: NOISE workshop, Netherlands Research School of Gender Studies
• Sunday, Sept 14: travel to Berlin, Germany
• Sunday, Oct 12: travel to Prague, Czech Republic
• Thurs, Nov 6-Sat, Nov 8: weekend trip to Olomouc, Czech Republic
• Friday, Nov 14: Women’s and Gender Studies in Europe classes and ISPs end
• Monday, Nov 17: All student academic work, including ISP work, submitted
• Tuesday, Nov 18: students depart from Prague, Czech Republic

Tuition and Program Fees