Cathy Young wrote an excellent summary of the problem with women’s studies departments, Propaganda discredits value of women’s studies.
The bottom line: studies of sex and gender are indeed important, but are undermined by the explicit political agenda of many women’s studies departments. By limiting discourse to only one predtermined outcome — typically radical feminist in nature — women’s studies dpeartments today do as much to hid the reality of women’s lives as academia’s male-centered focus did for the first half of the 20th century.
“What’s wrong with women’s stuedies?” Young asks,
The courses, critics say, tend to stress political indoctrination and personal experiences rather than scholarship; dubioius tehories and facts are presetned as gospel; male villainy is endlessly preached; and young women are trained to regard themselves as perpetual victims.
Source:
Propaganda discredits value of women’s studies. Cathy Young, The Detroit News, November 10, 2000.