 2014 - 2015 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| 0607-5319-01 | Singlehood as a Test Case | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| FACULTY OF HUMANITIES | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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University credit hours: 4.0
Course description
Singlehood is a relatively new field of study, and has often been treated as an addendum to family studies. The definition of single persons as un-married or un-attached already relates to some of the underlying presuppositions about singlehood and single persons. One of the main departure points of this seminar will be rethinking some of these prevalent definitions and reconsidering the social and symbolic boundaries conjoining and separating single persons from society.
Thus, this seminar seeks to locate singlehood within the framework of existing feminist and social literature, critically examine a range of theoretical frameworks and inquire their relevance to understanding the discursive formation of singlehood. Some of the key topics to be explored are: aloneness, individualism and loneliness in late modern societies, choice and happiness, singlehood in different historical and cultural contexts, time, age and the hetrenormative life cycle.