Syllabus
PLSI 467 Politics
and Women in the
|
Instructor: Office: Office
hours: Phone: |
Francis Neely HSS 139 Tues. or by appointment 415/338-1522 |
Monday, Wednesday 10:10 – 11:50 HSS 246 Email : fneely@sfsu.edu Web page: http://bss.sfsu.edu/fneely |
Course Description:
Although
the majority of citizens in the
The course focuses on
electoral politics. What are the
barriers to women reaching office? How
have women fared in local, state, and national elections? How is representation affected, if at all,
once women are elected? We’ll examine
these and other questions by looking at the history of women in politics, the
various challenges women face in the political arena, the status of women in
office, and the policy areas most associated with women and women’s groups.
Goals:
1.
Understand the status of women in electoral politics,
including current and historical trends.
2.
Know the prominent models of representation.
3.
Appreciate the philosophical arguments underlying
feminist perspectives on policy and political process, and the contribution of
feminist theory to the study of politics.
4.
Assess the difficulty in defining women’s political
interests, and the challenge of gauging group representation.
5.
Develop a personal view of the performance of our
political system in regard to women’s interests.
Course Requirements:
Prerequisites:
You must have completed PLSI 200 or an equivalent. You should understand the political
institutions in the
Attendance/Participation: You are
expected to attend class, complete the readings before class, and to
participate in discussions.
Paper: You will write a short paper (5 – 7 pages)
that includes references to at least five sources from outside the class
readings. You will choose from several
assigned topics. In the paper you should
display a grasp of the material as well as an ability to critically review
it. I encourage you to contact me and
discuss your papers as you are working on them.
Please read the attached statement on plagiarism. If you have any questions, ask. Late papers will be marked down one grade
step (e.g., from a B to a B-) for each day they are late.
Midterm and Final exam: The exams will
require you to demonstrate knowledge about the course material covered in
lectures, discussions, and the readings.
They will be a combination of objective questions (multiple choice and
true/false), definitions, short answers, and essays. The final exam is not cumulative. You must have your student identification
card to take the exams.
Grades: Grades will be based on the point you receive
and will be assigned as follows: 100 –
90 (A, A-), 89 – 80 (B+, B, B-), 79 – 70 (C+, C, C-), 69 – 60 (D+, D, D-), less
than 60 (F).
|
Midterm exam Final exam Paper Attendance and
participation Total |
30 30 35 5 100 |
points points points points points |
Required Books:
The books have been ordered
through the SFSU Bookstore and are also available through the Internet stores.
McGlen, Nancy E., Karen O’Connor, Laura
van Assendfelft, and Wendy Gunther-Canada. 2001. Women, Politics, and American Society. Third edition.
Darcy, R., Susan Welch, and Janet Clark. 199X. Women,
Elections, and Representation. Second edition, revised.
Thomas,
Sue, and
Reingold,
Beth. 2000. Representing Women: Sex, Gender, and Legislative Behavior in
A
small reader containing two items is also required.
Other Considerations:
Please review the San
Francisco State University Bulletin's
"General Policies and Procedures" section (pp. 107-116) for
university policy regarding drops, withdrawals, incompletes, etc. If you have a physical, psychological,
medical, or learning disability that may impact on your ability to carry out
assigned course work, I urge you to talk with me and contact the staff in the
Finally, I encourage you to
see me during office hours. If you
cannot make it during my scheduled hours, we can set an appointment. I especially recommend talking with me about
your paper.
SECTION
I: BACKGROUND AND HISTORICAL CONTEXT
September 4 Women in
Read: McGlen and O’Connor,
Introduction, Chapter 1
Flammang,
Chapter 1 (in reader)
________________________________________________________
Week
3, September 9 Women in
Read: Darcy,
Welch, and
Reingold, Chapter 1
September 11 9/11 and its impact
Read: O’Connor
essay on 9/11 (in reader)
________________________________________________________
Read: McGlen and
O’Connor, Chapter 3
Thomas and Wilcox, Chapter 13
September 18 Economic
status
Read: McGlen and
O’Connor, Chapter 4
________________________________________________________
Week 5, September 23 Reproductive rights
Read: McGlen and
O’Connor, Chapter 5
September
25 Family
Read: McGlen and
O’Connor, Chapter 6
PAPER PROPOSALS DUE
9/25 LAST DAY TO DROP WITHOUT
RECEIVING A “W”
________________________________________________________
Week
6, September 30 Summary of Sections I and II
Read: McGlen and O’Connor, Chapter 7
October
2 Potential
officeholders, the pool of eligible candidates
Read: Darcy, Welch, and
Thomas and Wilcox, Introduction, Chapter 1
PAPER PROPOSALS RETURNED
________________________________________________________
Week 7, October 7 Attitudes,
stereotypes, and discrimination
Read: McGlen and
O’Connor, Introduction, Chapter 2
October
9 Media coverage, financing campaigns, regional
differences
Read: Thomas and Wilcox, Chapters 2, 3, 4 and 7
________________________________________________________
Week 8, October 14 Turnover,
keeping women in office
Read: Darcy,
Welch, and
October
16 Election systems, structural barriers
Review
Sections I, II, and III
Read: Darcy, Welch, and
________________________________________________________
Week 9, October 21 Midterm exam
October
23 Review midterm exam
Video: If Women Ruled the World
________________________________________________________
Week 10, October 28 Video: If Women Ruled the World
Preview of Sections IV and V
October 30 Local and state politics
The current election
Read: Darcy, Welch, and Clark, Chapter 2 and 3
________________________________________________________
Read: Thomas and Wilcox, Chapters 5, 6, 10, 11,
and 12
November 6 National politics
Read: Darcy, Welch, and Clark, Chapter 4
________________________________________________________
Week
12, November 11 National
politics
Read: Thomas and Wilcox, Chapters 8 and 9
Read: Reingold,
Introduction and Chapter 2, review Chapter 1
________________________________________________________
Week 13, November 18 Representing women
Read: Reingold, Chapters
3 and 4
November
20 Making Policy
Read: Reingold, Chapters
5 and 6
________________________________________________________
Week 14, November 25 Legislative strategies
Read: Reingold, Chapter 7
PAPERS DUE AT THE BEGINNING
OF CLASS
November
27 Other studies of state
legislatures
11/28 – 11/30 THANKSGIVING
BREAK
________________________________________________________
Week 15, December 2 Back to the case study: How and when women make a difference
Read: Reingold, Chapters
8 and 9
December
4 The future for women
in
Read: Darcy, Welch, and Clark, Chapter 8
Thomas
and Wilcox, Chapter 14
McGlen and O’Connor, Chapter 7
________________________________________________________
Week 16, December 9 The future for
the study of women in politics
Review: Flammang chapter (in reader)
December 11 Summary of course
Prepare for final exam
________________________________________________________
December 14, 16-20 Final exams
________________________________________________________
Plagiarism is the most
common form of academic dishonesty. The following
passage, taken from Richard M. Eastman’s book entitled Style, provides a cogent definition of plagiarism:
(P)lagiarism
is the offering of someone else’s words, pictures, data, ideas, and even
conceptions as if they were one’s own. Writers are
indeed encouraged to draw upon the information and wisdom of others, but in the
spirit of intellectual inquiry they are expected to state such indebtedness so
that (a) their own creativity can be justly appreciated and (b) their use of
sources, like a scientist’s experiment, can be verified by others. Plagiarism differs from this productive use of sources in
that the similarity of the original to the borrowing is very close; it is
acknowledged imperfectly or not at all; and it shows little or no creative
application by the borrower.
Plagiarism is a prime
intellectual offense in that the borrower is faking discovery process. No community of writers and readers can thrive if its
members counterfeit their achievements, deceive their critics, and take unfair
competitive advantage of others. (Pages 270-1 of Style by Richard M. Eastman.
Plagiarism comes in many
forms which include (but are not necessarily limited to) the following:
1. Copying verbatim another person’s written words without proper
acknowledgment. In the case of a direct quote, “proper
acknowledgment” entails placing quotation marks around the passage or (in the
case of an extended passage) indenting the quotation.
2. Paraphrasing another person’s written words without proper
acknowledgment. Rephrasing the words does not remove
the writer’s obligation to indicate clearly that the material belongs to
someone else.
3. Quoting or paraphrasing words that were found in a secondary
source as if they were found in a primary source. Suppose,
for example, that another author uses a quotation from Alfred Marshall that you
would like to use in your paper. You may not present
the quotation in a manner that will lead readers to believe that you found it
by reading
Note: The points made in
items 1-3 apply to the use of diagrams, tables, and statistics as well as
words.
4. Failing to acknowledge editorial assistance that substantially
improves the style and/or quality of your writing. If
someone merely points out errors in grammar or punctuation in your writing, or
awkward passages, or gives comments about the overall structure of the paper,
which you then rewrite, it is not necessary to acknowledge their assistance,
although courtesy should lead you to acknowledge substantial helpful editorial
comments by colleagues. However, if your writing has
been edited or rewritten by someone else in such a way that the style and
quality no longer reflect your writing ability, you must acknowledge that
editorial assistance was received.
5. Presenting an idea, model, derivation, proof, etc. that other
researchers have developed or with which you received substantial assistance
without proper acknowledgment. Plagiarism is not
limited to the use of other people’s words, but it includes the improper use of
ideas and methodologies as well. If you choose to
present someone else’s model in your written work (for example), you must
indicate that the model did not originate with you. If
an important idea, proof, etc. was given to you by someone else, you must
acknowledge the help that you received.
An exception to this
point occurs when the model is so widely used and so well-known that it could
not possibly be mistaken by the reader as your own (e.g., basic supply and
demand models, or the use of ordinary least squares).
6. “Double submission” of papers. Students
may not submit the same paper for credit in more than one course without the
explicit permission of all instructors who will be evaluating the work.
Note that these rules
apply to all written work that you circulate. Also,
even starting with the first drafts given to your thesis advisor, you should
work at making the appropriate acknowledgments and discuss any uncertain points
with your advisor.
(This description of
plagiarism is from the Statement on Academic Honesty, found on the SUNY Stony
Brook Economics Department’s web pages: http://ws.cc.stonybrook.edu/economics/instruct/grad/honesty.html. Another explanation of plagiarism can be
found at the following SFSU site: http://online.sfsu.edu/~rone/StudentHelp/Plagiarism.html)