Gender and Women's Studies (GWS) Portal : GWS at UW-Madison

The Department of Gender & Women’s Studies provides an institutional home and an intellectual community to develop and disseminate knowledge about women and gender through an analysis of texts, social and cultural practices, and social institutions, both local and global, historical and contemporary. We explore the diverse empirical realities and creative meanings of gender and the lives of women, including their representations in the arts, culture, and history in global perspective. We examine the structures of inequality and the movements for social change, especially attuned to the intersections of gender with other dimensions of difference and inequality such as race, class, sexuality, religion, disability, and national origin. Through our scholarship, teaching and outreach, we engage our communities, our state, and the world with a commitment to social justice.

The Center for Research on Gender and Women (CRGW) was established in 1977 as part of the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies, to advance knowledge about gender and women both in the US and globally. The Center hosts the Wittig Postdoctoral Fellowship in Feminist Biology. It sponsors competitions for research funds and awards, hosts visiting scholars, builds institutional partnerships on and off campus, and publishes a weekly e-bulletin. In addition to its colloquium series, the Center for Research on Gender and Women organizes campus events, including lectures, workshops, and conferences, featuring campus, national, and international speakers.

The UNESCO Chair on Gender, Well-Being and a Culture of Peace, housed at UW-Madison, privileges evidence-based practices informed by gender analysis and drawn from participatory projects. It is grounded in a holistic notion of wellbeing and agency at all levels from the individual, to peer-groups and kinship networks, the state, the ecological commons.