Students answer: Why Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies?

“Choosing to be a GWS major happened the moment I looked behind the curtain, to find that the projected image I was meant to accept as truth, power, and intimidation, was created and controlled only by a man flipping switches and cranking gears. That’s when I realized, I always had the power to be in Reality all along.”

Cait Selitrennikoff, she/her/hers
University of California Berkeley, junior
Gender & Women’s Studies major

“Gender studies is a harmonic mixture of humanities and social sciences, encouraging study from every school of thought simultaneously using a feminist lens. Through theory, creativity, and research, I find myself constantly learning modes that denaturalize the systems that perpetuate stratification. Gender studies suggests critical frameworks that are empowering for and insightful towards whichever field I will choose to enter.”

 Talia Spencer Heyman, they/them/she/her
Smith College, junior
Study of Women and Gender major