HIST 160: History of Women in the United States

Citrus College Course Outline of Record

Citrus College Course Outline of Record
Heading Value
Effective Term: Fall 2024
Credits: 3
Total Contact Hours: 54
Lecture Hours : 54
Lab Hours: 0
Hours Arranged: 0
Outside of Class Hours: 108
Total Student Learning Hours: 162
Strongly Recommended: ENGL 101.
Transferable to CSU: Yes
Transferable to UC: Yes - Approved
Grading Method: Standard Letter, Pass/No Pass

Catalog Course Description

This course will introduce students to the major themes in American women's history, addressing topics that include pre-contact and colonial experiences, cross-cultural interactions, enslavement, family and gender roles, sexuality, work, and political activism. 54 lecture hours.

Course Objectives

  • understand the role of women and gender systems in the pre-Columbian and colonial periods
  • understand women's cultural and economic roles in both the Early Republic and Antebellum America
  • explain how African-American women redefined citizenship in post Civil War society
  • understand the role of various groups of women in the Suffrage movement
  • examine women's contributions to the Industrial Revolution, both World Wars and the New Deal
  • compare and contrast moments of female activism during various movements for women's rights, workers' right and racial justice
  • provide historical examples demonstrating the intersectionality of race, gender and sexuality
  • connect contemporary patterns of gender-based discrimination and modern activism with historical precedents

Major Course Content

  1. Introduction - Why Women's History?
  2. Women and Gender Systems in Early America (Pre- and Post-European Contact)
    1. Native American Women
    2. European Women
    3. African Women
    4. Families and Economic Roles
  3. Women in the Early Republic
    1. Republican Motherhood
    2. Women and Slavery
      1. Gendered Relations of Slavery
      2. Anti-Slavery Activism
  4. Women in Antebellum America
    1. The Cult of Domesticity
    2. The Market Revolution
      1. The Mill "Girls"
      2. Family and the Domestic Slave Trade
      3. Antebellum Reform
        1. Abolitionism
        2. Women's Rights Movement
  5. Expansion
    1. Manifest Destiny and the West
      1. Impact of the Mexican American War
      2. Immigration
  6. Civil War and Reconstruction
    1. Varied Experiences of War
    2. Free Families
    3. Constitutional Reform
  7. Women and Reform at the Turn-of-the-Century
    1. Women and Industrial Capitalism
    2. Progressivism
      1. The Club Movement
      2. The Suffrage Movement
    3. Women and Racism
      1. Life under Jim Crow
      2. Within the Suffrage Movement
  8. Culture and Activism in the Interwar Period
    1. Consumerism and Popular Culture
    2. Women in the Workforce
    3. Surviving the Great Depression
    4. Women and the New Deal
  9. Women and World War II
    1. Women's Defense Work on the Homefront
    2. Women in the Military
    3. Multiculturalism and the War
      1. Double Victory
      2. Japanese American Internment
  10. Post-War Women
    1. Cold War Suburbia
    2. The Feminine Mystique
    3. Lesbian Communities
    4. Labor Activism
    5. Civil Rights Activism and Legislation
  11. Second Wave Feminism
    1. The Liberal Feminists
    2. The Radical Feminists
    3. Third World Feminists
    4. Conservative Activism
  12. New Frontiers
    1. Workplace Rights
    2. Changing Family Dynamics
    3. Women in Politics
    4. Contemporary Activism 

Suggested Reading Other Than Required Textbook

Students will read short articles and/or primary sources pertinent to course content. These articles will be posted to Canvas, and they will be the basis of in-class and/or online discussions.

Examples of Required Writing Assignments

Students will submit written answers to prompts requiring them to analyze the arguments, use of evidence, and content of all major course readings.

Examples of Outside Assignments

Each student will conduct an oral history interview with a woman in the community who has lived through an historically important moment in the twentieth century, such as the Civil Rights Movement. Students will then write an essay placing this woman's experience in historical context, using lecture content and required readings to do so.

Instruction Type(s)

Lecture, Online Education Lecture

IGETC Area 3: Arts and Humanities

3B. Humanities

IGETC Area 4: Social and Behavioral Sciences

4. Social and Behavioral Sciences