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Majors, minors + certificates

Minor in Media, Sex and Gender (Minors) (MDGNDRMIN)The Media School

Students on Summer 2019, Fall 2019, or Spring 2020 requirements.

Description

The Media, Sex and Gender minor studies the highly complex and controversial role that mediated messages about sexuality and gender play in contemporary society. The minor allows The Media School to collaborate with a number of departments working on gender in media using their distinctive methods and approaches. The list of upper-level courses represents a variety of approaches and skills allowing students to engage with sexuality and gender by focusing on its construction and representation in film, through the study of these topics as their intersect with technology, as well as the investigation of these phenomena as broadly social constructs. Courses will investigate questions of ethical behavior, pleasure, consumption, and psychological impacts.

Minor requirements

The minor requires at least 15 credit hours, including the requirements listed below.

  1. Introduction to Media. One (1) course from the .
    • Examines the role media play in our lives-at work, at school, among family members, friends, and lovers-and analyzes pressing issues in media and society today, such as privacy, globalization, and convergence. (3 credit hours.)
    • P: Must be an Ernie Pyle Scholar, Media Scholar, or Academic Honors student. Examines the role media play in our lives-at work, at school, among family members, friends, and lovers-and analyzes pressing issues in media and society today, such as privacy, globalization, and convergence. Credit given for only one of MSCH-C 101 or MSCH-H 101. (3 credit hours.)
  2. Introduction to Media, Sex and Gender. One (1) course from the .
    • Critically examines how race and/or ethnicity are mediated through screen and audio-visual media (including film, video, television, radio, internet) and their cultural contexts.  Using humanities approaches, topics might focus on representations and debates within mainstream, art, or alternative media.  May address histories of race, racism, and racial justice.  Screenings may be required. Credit given for only one of CMCL-C 201 or MSCH-C 212. (3 credit hours.)
    • Examines the representation of women in the media and analyzes women's creative work as media producers from a social scientific perspective. The course will include lecture and discussion of areas of critical debate: visual representation across media platforms, women's employment in media industries; women as an audience/consumer group. Credit given for only one of MSCH-C 216 or TEL-T 192. (3 credit hours.)
  3. Advanced Media, Sex and Gender Electives.
    1. Media School Electives. One (1) course from the .
      • Construction of race and gender identities across a range of media. Emphasis on the power of sound/image representations to shape and contest ideas about race and gender. Topic varies. May be repeated with a different topic for a maximum of 6 credit hours in CMCL-C 412, JOUR-J 375, or MSCH-F 375. (3 credit hours.)
      • (approved topics only; see academic advisor) Media historiography, topics in national media history, national and international movements and trends. Topic varies. May be repeated with a different topic for a maximum of 6 credit hours in CMCL-C 420 and MSCH-F 420. (3 credit hours.)
      • P: A grade of C- or higher in MSCH-C 213 or TEL-T 205; or consent of instructor. Explores the role and portrayal of sex and sexuality in media and examines in detail the potential social and psychological effects of exposure to sexual content in the media. Credit given for only one of MSCH-S 410 or TEL-T 410. (3 credit hours.)
      • (approved topics only; see academic advisor) P: Senior standing in the Media School. Seminar exploring new developments and advanced research in media. May be repeated with a different topic for a maximum of 9 credit hours. (3 credit hours.)
    2. Additional Electives. Two (2) courses from the .
      • Additional course from the Media School Elective list above
      • Historical and critical overview of films produced by African American women from the 1940s to the present. The course emphasizes how black women filmmakers combine their creative abilities with a desire to capture dominant issues that affect black women's lives in America. (3 credit hours.)
      • Analysis of scholarship concerned with how the body is perceived, represented, and symbolically charged. This course examines concepts that include sexed bodies, desiring bodies, corporeality, body politics, and sociological bodily rituals. Thematically, the course investigates exterior/interior, solid/fluid, and sex/gender distinctions critical to discussions of the body. (3 credit hours.)
      • Investigates “gendered” ways that technological transformations reshape social life, physical space, built environments, or medical research. Familiarizes students with how feminist inquiry remaps such fields as computer technology, urban and development studies, geography, medicine, or health sciences. May be repeated with a different topic for a maximum of 6 credit hours. (3 credit hours.)
      • Advanced study of feminist film theory which examines gender in popular film from a variety of perspectives. Examines how cinema works as a “technology of gender,” how film constructs subject positions and identities, and what these constructions can tell us about how gender structures our culture. (3 credit hours.)
      • Examination of gender issues from international and interdisciplinary perspectives. May be repeated with a different topic for a maximum of 12 credit hours. (3 credit hours.)
      • P: SOC-S 370 or consent of department. A sociological examination of a variety of forms of human sexuality from the perspectives of social constructionism and politics of sexuality. (3 credit hours.)
  4. GPA, Minimum Grade, and Other Requirements. Each of the following:
    1. At least 9 credit hours in the minor must be completed in courses taken through the Indiana University Bloomington campus or an IU-administered or IU co-sponsored Overseas Study program.
    2. At least 9 credit hours in the minor must be completed at the 300–499 level.
    3. Except for the GPA requirement, a grade of C- or higher is required for a course to count toward a requirement in the minor.
    4. A GPA of at least 2.000 for all courses taken in the minor—including those where a grade lower than C- is earned—is required.
    5. Exceptions to minor requirements may be made with the approval of the department's Director of Undergraduate Studies, subject to final approval by the College of Arts and Sciences.