Handbook

Both within and outside the discipline of International Relations, there is today an acute awareness both of the need to take gender seriously and the importance of facilitating the transfer of knowledge between academics, practitioners and policymakers. POLS5132 explores the contributions and insights offered by feminist and gender scholars of global politics. You are asked to reflect on what it means to recognise gender in the structure, practice and theorising of global politics, exploring core subjects in the study and practice of International Relations through a gender lens. Taking this approach allows you to interrogate gendered structures of power and practice, analyse differences or similarities among masculine, feminine and fluid subjects in their experience of global politics, and critically assess the kinds of problems presented by efforts to theorise the body in global politics. Throughout, you will be encouraged to develop an informed awareness of specific issues relating to broader concerns in global politics, including race, postcolonialism, economic development, globalisation, security, conflict, peace and postconflict reconstruction. You will become familiar with the academic literature that constitutes the field of feminist International Relations and will gain insight into key debates such as those about theory and practice, scholarship and education and academia and policymaking as they relate to gender and global politics.