Gender Studies is an interdisciplinary academic program in the College of Arts and Letters at Notre Dame. Gender Studies analyzes the significance of gender—and the cognate subjects of sex, sexuality, race, ethnicity, class, religion, and nationality—in all areas of human life, especially in the social formation of human identities, practices, and institutions. Gender Studies gives scholars the methodological and theoretical tools to analyze gender and its cognates in their chosen disciplines in the arts, humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Gender Studies also provides its students and alumni with an intellectual framework in which the analysis of gender and its cognates can be creatively and critically applied to their personal, familial, professional, and civic roles. In the context of the Catholic identity of Notre Dame, Gender Studies facilitates the study of the intersection of gender and religion in the shaping of ethics, culture, and politics. Alongside our diverse array of courses drawn from across the university, our summer internship and academic-credit internship programs emphasize the holistic and practical life applications of a Gender Studies education at Notre Dame.
