Different Ways of Being: Introduction to Race, Gender, Sexuality, and Class

This course will introduce students to the concept of "intersectionality," as a foundational framework in sociology. To do so, we will examine how systems of power, specifically racism, sexism, classism, heterosexism, and cisnormality, interact to shape social identities among people who are multiply situated. We will engage with both classical and contemporary scholarship, media, and online sources to identify where race, gender, sexuality, and class "matter" in the lives of differently marginalized people. The goal of the course is to ensure that students are able to recognize the ways that race, gender, sexuality, and class operate simultaneously, apply an intersectional analysis to social institutions such as education, work, family, media, and nation.