Comparative Gender Studies

The PhD program in Comparative Gender Studies at Central European University (CEU)isfor students with substantial MA-level background in gender studies theory and methodologies who wish to specialize in interdisciplinary research and teaching in an academic setting.

Key Facts

• The Comparative Gender Studies at Central European University (CEU) is geared towards preparation for the academic job market, but skills and knowledge attained are also transferable to a number of non-academic careers. This page elaborates on the program’s approach and overview.

Program Objectives

• The rationale and design of the Ph.D. Program in Comparative Gender Studies are theoretical, methodological and practical.

• The program aims to combine theoretical and empirical inquiry into a wide range of gender issues. Its activities and courses facilitate the examination of diversified patterns of gendered social and cultural change.

• While the program has long supported research on Central and Eastern Europe we have been steadily expanding our areas to places outside of Europe; research projects may address any geographical or theoretical area that is supported by faculty expertise.
• Whatever regional, methodological, or topical focus students choose, the program helps them understand gender along continua of local and global or national and transnational, through both material and symbolic relations and always with an eye to cross-cutting hierarchies of power.

• In general, the program trains students to critically analyze gender as historically and culturally contextualized, with thorough consideration of salient institutions, epistemological reference points, and social, cultural, political, and economic processes.

• The program also strives to constantly attend to gender in intersection with other significant social categories such as race, nation, ethnicity, class, sexuality, age, ability, and so on.

Courses include:

• The Uses of Comparative and Integrative Perspectives for Women’s and Gender Studies;

• Research Methods in Gender Studies;

• Intimacy, Sexuality and Citizenship.