Battle of the Sexes: Are men hesitant to take women’s studies classes?
The question being proposed is a little one-sided. If I say “no,” then it seems I’m trying to be macho. If I say “yes,” then I could be called a sexist. Either way I answer, I lose. That being said, here I go.
Are we guys afraid of taking a class dedicated to studying women? Probably not; if anything we’re more afraid of women in general than we are of a class dedicated to studying them.
Does that make me a sexist? Am I closed-minded because I don’t want to take a class dedicated to studying women? No it doesn’t. In fact some of my favorite people are females: my mom, Mary Poppins, Tina Fey and the Queen of England.
I am no expert on women, and I don’t claim to be. Sure, it would be nice to know more, but I don’t have a real interest in taking a class that is dedicated to studying women.
If I had time for the class, I might look into it. If people knew more about the class then maybe more guys would take the class.
Women have never been considered equal with men. Throughout Western history that’s the way things have gone. It’s wrong and I don’t agree with it, but that’s how it’s happened.
In our male-dominated society, there are hundreds of thousands of women who have made their impact in politics, sports, business and entertainment.
According to JMU’s women’s studies Web site, “the idea of the interdisciplinary field of women’s studies emerged in the late 1960s as students and faculty recognized that research and teaching often ignored or devalued the contributions and experiences of women.”
Whether their achievements have been recognized or not doesn’t take away from their impact. I encourage everyone out there to take some time out of your day and research famous women. Find out what made Marie Curie, Elizabeth Blackwell and Sojourner Truth remarkable individuals.
Take some time out of your day to learn more about the accomplishments of women, they do deserve the recognition. Odds are I’m not going to take a women’s studies class, and if you’re a guy at JMU the odds are in favor you probably won’t take one either. In short, we’re not afraid to take classes dedicated to women, we just don’t want to.
Sean Youngberg is a sophomore SMAD major.
If you’ve ever taken a women’s studies or women’s fiction class at JMU or any other college, you would note that are there often as many males in the classroom as there are in the ladies bathroom—there’s either none or one who stumbles in by accident not fully understanding where he is until it’s too late.
Perhaps it’s the title or course description of these classes which includes the words “female” and “women” that scares off men. Maybe some men conclude (based on pure assumption) that since their gender is not included in the name they are unwelcome or simply uninterested.
However, if you’ve ever taken a “great works” class at JMU or any other university you may note one thing—most of the literature you read is by male authors. The Bronte sisters are thrown in most times for good measure, and if a professor is really daring he or she may even use Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. Despite the fact that more than 90 percent of the reading in the class is produced by males, we call this class “great works” when a more appropriate title would be: Great Works by Men and a Couple Thrown in by Women.
The pieces of literature we read by male authors are in no way unimportant. However, the fact that their female equivalents often go unread is not only a waste of good literature but utterly frustrating to female writers. A Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood is known as the female counterpart to George Orwell’s 1984, in which all women lose their freedoms under a male-dominated government regime. Joyce Johnson’s Minor Characters recalls her time during the beat generation and her off-beat relationship with Jack Kerouac—and her novel is just as thrill-seeking and adventurous as Kerouac’s famous On the Road. Even still Zelda Fitzgerald, married to Great Gatsby writer F. Scott Fitzgerald, had great potential as a writer seen in her letters to her husband in Dear Scott, Dearest Zelda and her published autobiographical novel Save Me the Waltz.
Perhaps women’s fiction classes will always be too taboo for males no matter how excellent a writer the female is, whether it be Jane Austen or Anne Sexton. But just think guys, if nothing else thrills you about taking a women’s fiction or studies class other than the fact that it fulfills a requirement, you will always be in the company of smart, intelligent women—and that is never a bad thing.
Sarah Delia is a junior English and art history major.
