The Program in Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies
What does it mean to abolish the police? Why do some communities have higher rates of COVID infection than others? What does anti-racism look like beyond hashtags? What is the relationship between the rise in anti-trans legislation and the ongoing assault on reproductive rights?
If any of these questions resonate, the GSWS Program at Penn invites you to learn more about our major and minor during your visit to Penn!
Scholars working in the field of gender & sexuality studies have been providing nuanced analysis of our everyday world for decades. The conceptual frameworks to come out of the field - for example, intersectionality, queer theory, and transformative justice - help us make sense of our current moment and, more importantly, equip us with the analytical skills to work towards a more just and equitable future. GSWS students have gone on to careers in medicine, teaching, law, journalism and politics, to name just a few trajectories.
Below is a list of GSWS events taking place during Quaker Days. You are welcome to attend one or all!
Questions? Contact Gwendolyn Beetham – gbeetham@sas.upenn.edu or visit our website: https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/program/undergraduate
Classes open to admitted students on Thursday, April 13th (please email gbeetham@sas.upenn.edu to let us know that you’ll be attending):
GSWS 1201/African American Literature
Professor Dagmawi Woubshet
10:15 am – 11:44 am BENN 201
GSWS 0003/Introduction to Sexuality Studies and Queer Theory
Professor Pearl Brilmyer
12 pm – 1:29 pm, MEYR B13
GSWS 5980/ Comparative Histories of Sexuality
Professor Abdulhamit Arvas
5:15 pm – 8:14 pm BENN 201
Student play: I Know the End
The Rotunda/4014 Walnut Street
Friday April 14, 7PM
Saturday April 15, 2PM
Sunday April 16, 5PM
I Know the End is an experimental, feminist 1-act play written and directed by senior GSWS major Sofia (Sof) Sears and produced/advised by Ricardo Bracho. This is a play about Los Angeles and all its urban folklore, Chicana experience, monsters, girlhood, trauma and rage, with a title borrowed from a Phoebe Bridgers song.
Content warning: this is a play largely about dead and murdered women, with lots of cursing, screaming, blood, general blasphemy, and lights/sound effects. Please attend at your own risk!
Estimated runtime is an hour, and there will be no intermission. Tickets are free. Check the registration link below to reserve a spot for one of the 3 showings: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/i-know-the-end-tickets-600835795037
Graduate Conference: Abolition
LGBT Center/ 3907 Spruce St
Saturday, April 15th, 10 am – 3:30 pm
Ruth Wilson Gilmore states “Abolition is about abolishing the conditions under which prison became the solution to problems, rather than abolishing the buildings we call prisons.” Abolition exists within the context of racialized, gendered, and ableist constructs of relating to one another as well. Angela Davis asks, “How can we produce a sense of belonging to communities that is not evaporated by the onslaught of our everyday routines?” Furthermore, Mia Mingus argues, “Any disability justice work should be in alignment and solidarity with abolition. And any abolition work should be in alignment and solidarity with disability justice. Disability justice is abolition work and abolition work is disability justice work.” The context of abolition is not just a question of prisons or the prison industrial complex, but the very intricate ties people have to one another, the environment, labor, capital, and the uneven delineations of surveillance and control that stretch across the mundane and spectacular aspects of everyday life.
The conference features undergraduate and graduate research by students across the University of Pennsylvania as well as a morning workshop and a keynote speaker. For more information and to register:
https://gsws.sas.upenn.edu/events/2023/04/15/gsws-graduate-conference-abolition-elias-rodriques