Chair: Sara Diaz
Associate Professor: S. Diaz
Assistant Professor: N. Rodriguez-Coss
The program offers one minor:
Minor in Women's and Gender Studies
Gonzaga’s Women’s and Gender Studies Department is an inter- and multi- disciplinary program that employs critical feminist theories and methodologies to foster transformative understanding of the intersections of gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, and class among other socially defined identities. Using gender as a central analytic, we examine and question systems of power, inequality, and injustice and their role in shaping lived experiences of persons, locally, nationally, globally. We foster an ethical and intellectual commitment to dismantle sexism, heterosexism, and other dimensions of intersecting oppressions such as racism and classism. Our faculty empower students to imagine a more just future and equip them with the tools to collectively enact it.
The program offers a twenty-one credit minor in Women’s and Gender Studies. There are three required courses: WGST 201 or WGST 202, WGST 401, and WGST 499. Students also select four elective courses from inside the department or from several disciplines, including English literature, history, philosophy, political science, religious studies, and sociology. A maximum of six elective credits may be lower-division courses with a WGST number. Further, a maximum of six elective credits may be component courses (“C” suffix), with the remainder of electives being upper division electives with a WGST number or full women’s studies courses.
Full women’s studies courses systematically use the methods, themes, and approaches of feminist scholarship throughout the semester. In component courses, one-third to one-half of the course material addresses gender issues and/or uses feminist perspectives. A maximum of nine credits may be taken in any one discipline. WGST 401 will not be included in this count.
Minor in Women’s and Gender Studies: 21 credits |
|
| Lower Division | |
| One of the following two courses | 3 credits |
|
WGST 201 Sex, Gender, and Society
|
|
|
WGST 202 Gender, Difference and Power
|
|
| WGST 200 Level Electives | 0-6 credits |
| Upper Division | |
| WGST 300 Level and above electives | 6-12 credits |
| WGST 401 Feminist Thought | 3 credits |
| WGST 499 Symposium | 3 credits |
| Note: Component courses have a “C” suffix. | |
Lower Division
The First-Year Seminar (FYS) introduces new Gonzaga students to the University, the Core Curriculum, and Gonzaga’s Jesuit mission and heritage. While the seminars will be taught by faculty with expertise in particular disciplines, topics will be addressed in a way that illustrates approaches and methods of different academic disciplines. The seminar format of the course highlights the participatory character of university life, emphasizing that learning is an active, collegial process.
Explores theories and research on the constructions of masculinity and femininity and how these influence our individual lives and social institutions.
Equivalent:
SOCI 244 - OK if taken since Fall 2021
SOSJ 220 - OK if taken since Fall 2015
SOSJ 220 - OK if taken since Fall 2015
This course examines the construction and practice of gender in various contexts, with an emphasis on the intersection of gender, race, sexuality, nationality, and (dis)ability. Using an interdisciplinary methodology to understand, analyze and critique gendered power dynamics in society from a sociological, political, anthropological, and historical perspective, this course specifically explores topics such as cultural performances of feminine and masculine behavior, sexuality, women’s rights, militarism, family life, globalization, environmental issues, representation, and social change.
In the digital media age popular culture saturates many aspects of everyday life. This course is a critical examination of the ways popular culture generates and shapes images of gender, race/-ethnicity, class, and sexuality. In order to understand how popular cultural shapes understandings of and attitudes towards gender, the course will pay special attention to the ways femininity and masculinity are represented and contested in multiple forms of commercial media and independent popular culture including music, film, television, print media, video games, news, sports, social media, and various "objects" of material culture, such as food, toys, and clothing. The course uses cultural studies methods to examine the production, meanings, and social uses of popular culture by multiple communities in local and global contexts.
This course examines the social context of health, illness and health care. Particular attention will be paid to the effects of culture and social inequality on health, the interaction of various health care professionals, and political debates about the health care system.
Equivalent:
HEAL 201 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
SOCI 283 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
SOSJ 221 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
SOCI 283 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
SOSJ 221 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
This course introduces student to literacy study through the exploration of gender in the major genres of literature (poetry, fiction, and drama).
Equivalent:
ENGL 102 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
This course examines gender issues in various literary texts. Course may focus on only one genre or may include several genres.
Equivalent:
ENGL 202 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
An introductory exploration of the relationship between literature & film, with the goal of learning to "read" films critically and appreciatively.
Equivalent:
ENGL 270 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
This course introduces students to the diverse nature of multicultural literature while helping them develop increasingly complex understandings of the continually evolving issues connected to national and international discourses on race and ethnicity, as well as gender and sexuality. We explore the ways in which literature contributes to the definition and redefinition of individual and collective identities from multiple perspectives.
An expository writing course designed to help students express themselves more effectively. A majority of readings and writing assignments will have a thematic focus on women's and gender issues.
Explores several approaches to ethics, including a feminist perspective, considering how each theoretical approach is grounded. Examines the process of ethical decision-making and how gender affects how we approach ethical issues. Contemporary ethical issues are examined, some of which are gender-related.
This course introduces students to the Hebrew Bible with special attention given to texts dealing with women.
Equivalent:
RELI 203 - OK if taken since Fall 2020
An introduction to the academic discipline of Christian theology, and the way in which the Christian community makes believing possible and meaningful for contemporary people of faith. Particular attention is given to the impact of feminist scholarship on the doing of Christian theology.
Equivalent:
RELI 234 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
The focus of this course is to examine the identity and mission of the church as an institution and a community of faith emerging from Vatican Council II. Feminist theology will provide the lens for examining the role of women in the church in both historical and contemporary situations.
Equivalent:
RELI 231 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
An introduction to women and men in the civilizations in the Mediterranean region and Europe from circa 3100 BC to AD 1648 with a focus on political, social, economic, religious and cultural matters. This course will highlight individual and group ideas, institutions, and events which have contributed to western society.
Topic to be determined by faculty.
Upper Division
This course examines the intersections of race, class and gender with respect to a wide range of issues in the United States and in relationship to the transnational context. While emphasizing race, class and gender, other categories of difference will be woven throughout (sexuality, gender identity, disability, etc.). We will use an interdisciplinary lens to explore social stratification; globalization and neoliberalism; the historical process of racialization; social class, sex, sexuality, gender across time, cultures, gender ideologies, and feminisms. We will analyze how race and ethnicity are reproduced, maintained, contested, resisted in social relations, institutional structures, and cultural practices.
Equivalent:
SOSJ 328 - OK if taken since Fall 2017
This course is an introduction to the interdisciplinary field of Feminist Science and Technology Studies. Students will learn what the field of FSTS has to say about various social justice issues, such as equity for women in science, the history of the science of human difference, how human values shape science in action for better or worse, and what feminism has to offer the scientific endeavor The course will explore a series of interrelated questions: How do scientific understandings of human difference (gender, race, sexuality, etc.) shape who participates in science, historically and in the present moment? What is the relationship between politics, culture, and science? What are some of the experiences of women and other minoritized people in science fields? How have the sciences been used to perpetuate injustice (war, environment, unethical human subjects, research)? Can the sciences be used to advance social Justice? How can feminism shape the culture and practice of science? And, what do the sciences have to offer feminist thought?
Equivalent:
HEAL 331 - OK if taken since Fall 2022
This course explores key feminist debates from a global perspective focusing on collaborations and activist efforts across geographical and cultural borders. We will examine how those collaborations work to eradicate a variety of social inequalities targeting women and other historically marginalized groups. Among the issues to be discussed are reproductive rights, feminicides, sex trafficking, armed conflicts, and environmental protection.
This course examines a variety of genres in American literature through the 1840s: essays, novels, short stories, sermons, poems, women’s captivity narratives, and autobiographies. The course will move from Spanish and Native American narratives of contact to the self-questioning of Puritan writers and the mythologizing tendencies of Crevecoeur, Franklin, Cooper, and later writers. In exploring Native American and African American texts as well as works by Emerson and Hawthorne, students will consider the ways in which gender and race help to shape an American literary canon.
Equivalent:
WOMS 321C - Taken before Fall 2009
This course analyzes the development of American literature from the romanticism of the 1830s to the blooming of the American Renaissance of the 1850s and 1860s. Writers such as Hawthorne, Poe, Emerson, Whitman, Thoreau, and Dickinson will be read alongside less canonical writers such as Fuller, Davis, Douglass, Jacobs, and Stowe. This course seeks to broaden an understanding of American literature by reading works from a variety of genres (short stories, poems, essays, autobiographies, novels) and from writers of different races, classes, and geographical backgrounds.
Equivalent:
ENGL 311 - OK if taken since Fall 2020
Examining both nineteenth- and twentieth-century literary works, African-American literature seeks to expose students to the historical, aesthetic, and cultural backgrounds of black writers and writing in America. Beginning with the classic slave narratives, late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century black intellectuals (e.g., Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. Dubois) will introduce the students to the social and political dissension among advocates of black liberation. The course will sample the aesthetic flowering of writers of the Harlem Renaissance (e.g. Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston) and twentieth-century plays and novels (e.g. Lorraine Hansberry, Ralph Ellison, Toni Morrison, August Wilson).
This course surveys American literature from the 1870s to 1950. We will discuss some of the following developments and authors of the 19th century: the rise of realism (James, Wharton) and naturalism (Crane, Dreiser), regional literature (Jewett, Freeman), and African American literature (Washington, DuBois, Chesnutt). The survey of 20th-century literature includes works by several modern poets (Eliot, Frost, Hughes), novelists (Hurson, Faulkner, Welty), and dramatists (Odetts, O'Neill).
Equivalent:
ENGL 312 - OK if taken since Fall 2020
This course explores the history of American women from the colonial era to the present using a women and gender studies framework. The class investigates gender roles and the ways that race, class, politics, national origin, colonization, and the passage of time alter those expectations. This seminar style course investigates women’s economic and political lives and social contributions through suffrage, reform, civil rights, feminism, and more.
This course will investigate the lives of women in both the pre-contact and post-conquest societies. The first part of the course concentrates on the activities of women, and their role in society, among the Aztecs, Inca, and Pueblo civilizations. The course will follow with the study of their experiences after the Spanish Conquest. The final section of the course will cover the variety of women, ranging from wealthy Spanish women, established nuns, marginal mystics, Indian leaders, and African women, and their experiences in the Spanish colonies. Students will learn about and discuss the various gender systems which operated in different periods, and how these systems shaped women's lives as women shaped the systems themselves.
Equivalent:
HIST 384 - OK if taken since Fall 2017
History and dynamics of women's political movements (both conservative and liberal) in the U.S. Survey of women's current levels and styles of participation in U.S. government and politics.
Equivalent:
POLS 322 - Successful completion
SOSJ 342 - OK if taken since Fall 2015
SOSJ 342 - OK if taken since Fall 2015
Explores city life and all the elements that define it; the problems and prospects of the urban policy that surround , influence, constrain, and color city life. Special attention is paid to the role of women as citizens and activists in the urban context.
Equivalent:
POLS 312 - OK if taken since Spring 2010
Compares the lives of women around the world; their public and private roles and responsibilities, positions in government, the economy, and the private sphere. This course seeks to explain women's status differences in various regions and societies by looking at the influence of culture, religion, economics, and politics.
Equivalent:
INST 326 - Successful completion
POLS 363 - Successful completion
POLS 363 - Successful completion
A case-based examination of Supreme Court decisions treating aspects of the Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment. These decisions cover topics such as freedom of speech, freedom of press, religious freedoms, the right to privacy, and questions of discrimination in its many forms including racial, sexual, and voting rights.
Equivalent:
POLS 303 - Successful completion
This course examines the origins, patterns, reforms, and criticisms of American social policy. Consideration of ties between knowledge and social policy, and the particular impact of education, health care, and welfare policies on women, children, different racial and ethnic groups, and the middle class. A review of normative claims for the proper role of the state and capitalism, as well as comparisons with other western, capitalist societies and their policy regimes. Upon sufficient demand.
Equivalent:
POLS 327 - Successful completion
Examines the conditions facing selected racial and ethnic groups in the U.S., with African Americans being the primary case for analysis. Topics include the social construction of race and ethnicity, the wide range of political strategies and tactics employed by racial and ethnic groups in pursuit of equality, and U.S. immigration policy.
Equivalent:
POLS 326 - OK if taken since Spring 2010
An introduction to women as creators of fine and decorative art within North America and Europe from the late 18th C. to today. The course also addresses how women have been represented in art by men and other women.
Equivalent:
VART 407 - OK if taken since Fall 2015
A review of both the theory and empirical literature investigating the psychology of gender (including biological cognitive, developmental, and psychosocial models).
Prerequisite:
PSYC 206 Minimum Grade: D
or PSYC 207 Minimum Grade: D
or SOCI 304 Minimum Grade: D
or SOCI 204 Minimum Grade: D
Equivalent:
PSYC 416 - OK if taken since Fall 2009
Examines the tasks of feminist theologians and surveys the challenges and unique contributions they make to the integrity and vitality of contemporary Christianity. Offered every other year.
Equivalent:
RELI 340 - OK if taken since Fall 2020
Examines the tasks of feminist theologians and surveys the challenges and unique contributions they make to the integrity and vitality of contemporary Christianity.
Equivalent:
RELI 371 - Successful completion
This class analyzes the interplay between the treatment of ethics in the Bible and contemporary experiences of justice/injustice. This course focuses on four contemporary issues: wealth/poverty, violence/peace, nationalism/patriotism, and gender/sexuality.
Equivalent:
RELI 277 - OK if taken since Fall 2020
Examines images and practices of family life in American society. Uses historical material to show how ideals about family life have developed. Discusses definitions of "family" as political, with a special emphasis on the politics of gender. Connects debates over how to define and understand family with decisions about social policies.
Equivalent:
SOCI 342 - Successful completion
Topic to be determined by instructor.
Supervised reading in one of the previously mentioned areas of study, not to replace existing courses but to provide an opportunity for advanced study not available within the regular curriculum. Directed reading requires completion of a form, WGST Department Chair permission, and cannot be registered for via Zagweb.
Analyzes several varieties of feminist theory to explore how concepts of women, gender, and feminism have changed, and the effects of these changes on the lives of women and men. Explores the interactions between sex, gender, social class, race, and ethnicity. Invites students to consider future possibilities for eliminating gender inequalities. Fall.
Equivalent:
POLS 341 - OK if taken between Fall 2011 and Spring 2014
This course examines various theories for interpreting literature and culture.
Equivalent:
ENGL 480 - OK if taken since Spring 2010
The British novel from 1700-1800.
Equivalent:
ENGL 436 - Successful completion
Focuses on the varied dramatic traditions of Tudor and Stuart London besides Shakespeare. This is a period in which questions about gender roles were being openly debated, and in which literary and otherwise discursive interrogations of social roles, particularly the role of women, pervaded genres but were most vivid on stage.
Equivalent:
ENGL 434 - Successful completion
This course will discuss the language, themes, and preoccupations of Shakespeare, as well as his social, philosophical, and historical context. All the texts selected for close reading will feature strong female figures, and particular attention will be paid to the construction, impact, and implications of these women on other characters, on the form of their texts, and on us, the inheritors of their literary and cultural tradition. Readings will include Taming of the Shrew, Macbeth, and Anthony and Cleopatra, in addition to secondary sources featuring feminist theory and literary criticism.
A study of the literature of the English Early Modern period ranging from More to Milton and including the emerging literary voice of women writers. British literature covering the period 1500-1700, excluding drama.
Equivalent:
ENGL 331 - OK if taken since Spring 2011
This course explores the diverse literary themes, social contexts, and intellectual backgrounds of the American novel from its beginnings in romantic tradition through the realist and naturalist movements of the late nineteenth century. Works by Hawthorne, Melville, Stowe, Wharton, James, Twain, Harper, and others offer a rich opportunity to investigate issues not only of literary value but of race, class and gender in nineteenth-century America. In addition to analyzing each work's form and genre, we will ask the following questions: What accounts for the inclusion (or exclusion) of this work from the canon of American literature? In what ways does the work reflect, critique, or ignore its social context? Major American novels of the period 1800-1900.
Equivalent:
ENGL 413 - Successful completion
Close reading of works by Edith Wharton, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, Eudora Welty, Ralph Ellison, EL Doctorow, and Toni Morrison. The course will also examine the novels against the backgrounds of social history, literary history, and race and gender in American culture. Students are expected to participate in class discussion, collaborate in group work, and write in-class exercises and formal critical essays. Selected major novelists of the 20th Century.
Equivalent:
ENGL 414 - Successful completion
Focuses on thematically or historically-related novels (general topic/theme of the class varies). Through close examination of texts, critical background and theory, this course explores the way gender issues, among other issues, are portrayed by various English and/or American writers.
Equivalent:
ENGL 462 - Successful completion
The Core Integration Seminar (CIS) engages the Year Four Question: “Imagining the possible: What is our role in the world?” by offering students a culminating seminar experience in which students integrate the principles of Jesuit education, prior components of the Core, and their disciplinary expertise. Each section of the course will focus on a problem or issue raised by the contemporary world that encourages integration, collaboration, and problem solving. The topic for each section of the course will be proposed and developed by each faculty member in a way that clearly connects to the Jesuit Mission, to multiple disciplinary perspectives, and to our students’ future role in the world.
Analyzes the concepts of sex, sexuality, and gender by working with authors across traditions and disciplines. We will be particularly concerned with the role of sex, sexuality, and gender may have on identity formation/subversion, questioning whether some or all of these concepts are essential/natural or socially constructed.
Equivalent:
PHIL 442 - OK if taken since Fall 2016
Explores women's experiences of oppression and some of the ways in which this has marginalized their concerns and their perceptions of the moral dimension. Feminist contributions to re-thinking the concept of moral agency, the traditionally sharp distinction between the public and private domains, the relevance of personal relationships to ethics, and the process of moral development and moral decision-making are considered. Spring, odd years.
Equivalent:
PHIL 456 - Successful completion
This course provides an in-depth study of literary works written by women. May cover a variety of genres, time periods, and cultures or may be genre, period, or culture specific.
Equivalent:
ENGL 460 - Successful completion
Supervised reading in one of the previously mentioned areas of study, not to replace existing courses but to provide an opportunity for advanced study not available within the regular curriculum. Directed reading requires completion of a form, WGST Department Chair permission, and cannot be registered for via Zagweb.
Specialized research into a topic of feminist scholarship. Directed study requires completion of a form, WGST Department Chair permission, and cannot be registered for via Zagweb.
Prerequisite:
(WGST 201 Minimum Grade: D
or WGST 202 Minimum Grade: D)
and WGST 401 Minimum Grade: D
(WOMS 201 Minimum Grade: D
Opportunities to work as an intern with various agencies that assist women in Spokane. Students must take the initiative to contact an agency and a faculty supervisor. Students meet with a member of the Women's and Gender Studies faculty to discuss their experiences and write a paper integrating their internship experience with their WGST coursework. Fall and Spring.
The capstone course in the women's studies concentration provides an opportunity for a special kind of faculty and student conversation. Responsibility for organizing and structuring this course will rotate among women's studies faculty. Topics will vary. Regardless of the texts or topics, the goal will be to create a conversation in which students assume significant responsibilities. All students are expected to complete a major research project using the concepts and perspectives of feminist scholarship, and to present their work to the class and faculty evaluators. Spring only.
Prerequisite:
(WGST 201 Minimum Grade: D
or WGST 202 Minimum Grade: D
or SOCI 244 Minimum Grade: D)
and (WGST 401 Minimum Grade: D
or SOCI 390 Minimum Grade: D
or POLS 341 Minimum Grade: D)
WGST 401 Minimum Grade: D
In addition to their major and minor areas of study, all undergraduate students follow a common program designed to complete their education in those areas that the University considers essential for a Catholic, Jesuit, liberal, and humanistic education. The University Core Curriculum consists of forty-five credits of course work, with additional designation requirements that can be met through core, major, or elective courses.
The University Core Curriculum is a four-year program, organized around one overarching question, which is progressively addressed through yearly themes and questions. Hence, core courses are best taken within the year for which they are designated. First year core courses encourage intellectual engagement and provide a broad foundation of fundamental skills. Second and third year courses examine central issues and questions in philosophy and religious studies. The fourth year course, the Core Integration Seminar, offers a culminating core experience. Taken at any time throughout the four years, broadening courses intersect with the core themes and extend students’ appreciation for the humanities, arts, and social and behavioral sciences. Finally, the designation requirements (writing enriched, global studies, and social justice) reflect important values and reinforce students’ knowledge and competencies.
Overarching Core Question: As students of a Catholic, Jesuit, and Humanistic University, how do we educate ourselves to become women and men for a more just and humane global community?
Year 1 Theme and Question: Understanding and Creating: How do we pursue knowledge and cultivate understanding?
- The First-Year Seminar (DEPT 193, 3 credits): The First-Year Seminar (FYS), taken in the fall or spring of the first year, is designed to promote an intellectual shift in students as they transition to college academic life. Each small seminar is organized around an engaging topic, which students explore from multiple perspectives. The FYS is offered by many departments across the University (click here [PDF] for list of FYS courses).
- Writing (ENGL 101, 3 credits) and Reasoning (PHIL 101, 3 credits): The Writing and Reasoning courses are designed to help students develop the foundational skills of critical reading, thinking, analysis, and writing. They may be taken as linked sections. Writing (ENGL 101) carries one of the three required writing-enriched designations (see below).
- Communication & Speech (COMM 100, 3 credits): This course introduces students to interpersonal and small group communication and requires the application of critical thinking, reasoning, and research skills necessary to organize, write, and present several speeches.
- Scientific Inquiry (BIOL 104/104L, CHEM 104/104L, or PHYS 104/104L, 3 credits): This course explores the scientific process in the natural world through evidence-based logic and includes significant laboratory experience. Students pursuing majors that require science courses will satisfy this requirement through their major.
- Mathematics (above Math 100, 3 credits): Mathematics courses promote thinking according to the modes of the discipline—abstractly, symbolically, logically, and computationally. One course in mathematics, above Math 100, including any math course required for a major or minor, will fulfill this requirement. MATH 100 (College Algebra) and courses without the MATH prefix do not fulfill this requirement.
Year 2 Theme and Question: Being and Becoming: Who are we and what does it mean to be human?
- Philosophy of Human Nature (PHIL 201, 3 credits): This course provides students with a philosophical study of key figures, theories, and intellectual traditions that contribute to understanding the human condition; the meaning and dignity of human life; and the human relationship to ultimate reality.
- Christianity and Catholic Traditions (RELI, 3 credits). Religious Studies core courses approved for this requirement explore diverse topics including Christian scriptures, history, theology, and practices as well as major contributions from the Catholic intellectual and theological traditions (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses) .
Year 3 Theme and Question: Caring and Doing: What principles characterize a well lived life?
- Ethics (PHIL 301 or RELI, 3 credits): The Ethics courses are designed to help students develop their moral imagination by exploring and explaining the reasons humans should care about the needs and interests of others. This requirement is satisfied by an approved ethics course in either Philosophy (PHIL 301) or Religious Studies (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses).
- World/Comparative Religion (RELI, 3 credits): Religious Studies courses approved for this core requirement draw attention to the diversity that exists within and among traditions and encourage students to bring critical, analytical thinking to bear on the traditions and questions considered. These courses carries one of the required two global-studies designations (see below) (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses).
Year 4 Theme and Question: Imagining the Possible: What is our role in the world?”
- Core Integration Seminar (DEPT 432, 3 credits). The Core Integration Seminar (CIS) offers students a culminating core experience in which they integrate the principles of Jesuit education, prior components of the core, and their disciplinary expertise. Some CIS courses may also count toward a student’s major or minor. The CIS is offered by several departments across the University (click here [PDF] for list of CIS courses).
The Broadening Courses
- Fine Arts & Design (VART, MUSC, THEA, 3 credits): Arts courses explore multiple ways the human experience can be expressed through creativity, including across different cultures and societies. One approved course in fine arts, music, theatre, or dance will fulfill this requirement (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses).
- History (HIST, 3 credits): History courses are intended to develop students’ awareness of the historical context of both the individual and the collective human experience. One course in History (HIST 101, HIST 102, HIST 112, HIST 201, HIST 202) will fulfill this requirement.
- Literature (3 credits): Literature courses foster reflection on how literature engages with a range of human experience. One approved course in Literature (offered by English, Classics, or Modern Languages) will fulfill this requirement (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses).
- Social & Behavioral Sciences (3 credits): Courses in the social and behavioral sciences engage students in studying human behavior, social systems, and social issues. One approved course offered by Criminal Justice, Economics, Political Science, Psychology, Sociology, or Women and Gender Studies will fulfill this requirement (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses).
The Designations
Designations are embedded within already existing core, major, minor, and elective courses. Students are encouraged to meet designation requirements within elective courses as their schedule allows; however, with careful planning students should be able to complete most of the designation requirements within other core, major, or minor courses.
- Writing Enriched (WE; 3 courses meeting this designation): Courses carrying the WE designation are designed to promote the humanistic and Jesuit pedagogical ideal of clear, effective communication. In addition to the required core course, Writing (ENGL 101), which carries one of the WE designations, students must take two other WE-designated courses (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses).
- Global-Studies (GS; 2 courses meeting this designation): Courses carrying the GS designation are designed to challenge students to perceive and understand human diversity by exploring diversity within a context of constantly changing global systems. In addition to the required core course, World/Comparative Religion (RELI 300-level), which carries one of the GS designations, students must take one other GS-designated course (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses).
- Social-Justice (SJ; 1 course meeting this designation): Courses carrying the SJ designation are designed to introduce students to one or more social justice concerns. Students must take one course that meets the SJ designation (click here [PDF] for a list of approved courses).
Major-specific adaptations to the University Core Curriculum
All Gonzaga students, regardless of their major, will complete the University Core Curriculum requirements. However some Gonzaga students will satisfy certain core requirements through major-specific programs or courses. Any major-specific adaptations to the core are described with the requirements for the majors to which they apply.