This workbook is designed to engage you as you learn about the interdisciplinary study of women, gender, and sexuality in society. This workbook complements the lectures and the reader assigned in WGSS148 at Winona State University. It will be a space for reflection and interaction in this class.

Women’s, gender, & sexuality studies (WGSS) brings three fields of inquiry into conversation in order to engage critical analyses ranging from the personal to the global at the intersections of sex, gender, sexuality, race, class, ethnicity, and ability.

• Women’s Studies: foregrounds the lived experience and material conditions of women
• Gender Studies: highlights the social construction of masculinities and femininities
• Sexuality Studies: focuses on sexual behaviors, expressions, identities, and politics

It is integral to understand women’s studies, gender studies, and sexuality studies as having distinct disciplinary histories and as overlapping and transformational when taught in relation to one another.

The material in this course intentionally draws from these three fields to approach problems of sex, gender, and sexuality from various critical angles.