How can we use gender theory to provide students in English Studies with opportunities for transdisciplinary analysis and comparison across their literature and linguistics subjects?
The English Studies degree program at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona is interdisciplinary by nature, involving coursework in English linguistics as well as the literatures and cultures of the anglophone world. When we began teaching at the UAB in the 2021-22 academic year—Maria Rosa Garrido in linguistics and Nicholas Spengler in literature—we shared two observations about our students that would inspire this collaborative project. First, we observed that many of our students were using their interdisciplinary studies in English to think in transdisciplinary terms: that is, their understanding of linguistics informed their reading of literature and culture, and vice versa. Second, we observed that in both literature and linguistics subjects, our students were especially engaged with the question of how language contributes to the discursive construction of gender. Students often reflected on sexist uses of language and analyzed inequalities in the construction of gender in English-language literature and communication, even as they lacked a broad understanding of gender theory.
This project aims to foster our students’ transdisciplinary interests in the discursive construction of gender by providing them with the critical tools necessary to analyze literary and linguistic texts in English from an informed gender-theoretical perspective.
Our teaching innovation project is a transdisciplinary collaboration involving, in the first instance, two subjects from the English Studies degree program: Pragmatics, a fourth-year linguistics subject taught by Maria Rosa; and U.S. Literature II (1900-1950), a third-year subject taught by Nick and two other literature colleagues, Laura Gimeno and Clara Román. The immediate objective of our project is to give students the theoretical tools to analyze gender constructions and perspectives in English-language texts in Pragmatics and U.S. Literature II. The broader objective is to provide a model for transdisciplinary collaborations in teaching and learning across our department. To this end, we have included in our working team not only the teachers of the two subjects in question but also teachers from the wider areas related to these subjects: English & Society (Maria Rosa Garrido and Eva Codó), Literature of the United States (Nicholas Spengler, Laura Gimeno, and Clara Román), and History and Culture of English-Speaking Countries (Arnau Roig and Laura Gimeno).
By compiling a shared bibliography of gender theory texts, with key extracts from each, we provide students with a critical-theoretical framework for understanding gender constructions and perspectives in the English-language texts studied in both subjects. In particular, we aim to facilitate students’ understanding of gender constructions as they developed in different historical contexts and through different intersectional perspectives, allowing them to relate, for example, the current struggle for the rights of transgender and non-binary people with the long history of the movements for women’s rights, gay rights, and Black rights. In addition to foundational texts in gender theory, queer theory, and intersectionality, our bibliography also includes a special focus on motherhood as a particularly rich topic for considering gender constructions in the texts studied.
Project funded by Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (2023-2024, Ajut per a Projectes d’Innovació i de Millora Docent)