Universität Wien

124184 VK BEd 08b.3: VK Cultural Studies and Language Education (2025W)

Unmarried Sisters: Celibate Politics, Sexualities, and Cultures in the History of the Women's Movement

5.00 ECTS (2.00 SWS), SPL 12 - Anglistik
Continuous assessment of course work
Moodle

Registration/Deregistration

Note: The time of your registration within the registration period has no effect on the allocation of places (no first come, first served).

Details

max. 25 participants
Language: English

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

N.B. Please note that there will be no sessions on the 28 October, 18 November, or 25 November. These missing sessions will be replaced by a supplementary block presentation session from 10:00-16:00 on Saturday 24.01.2026.

  • Tuesday 14.10. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Tuesday 21.10. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Tuesday 04.11. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Tuesday 11.11. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Tuesday 02.12. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Tuesday 09.12. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Tuesday 16.12. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Tuesday 13.01. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Tuesday 20.01. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A
  • Saturday 24.01. 10:00 - 16:00 Seminarraum 9, Kolingasse 14-16, OG01
  • Tuesday 27.01. 09:30 - 11:00 Seminarraum 6 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-O1-22.A

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

In the popular imagination, the practice of celibacy evokes images of male priests, Catholic moral values, and conservative, even reactionary, politics concerning women and sexuality. This VK explores a different history that centres less familiar feminist, queer, and activist versions of celibacy in women’s movements and literatures.
By historicising the changing meanings of unmarried, nonsexual and queer life, students will develop analytical and critical tools to read literary genres and images such as the women-only ‘celibate utopia’ of first-wave feminist science fiction, and the ‘celibate plot’, which charts a character’s development not towards integration into patriarchal social structures through marriage (as in the ‘marriage plot’) but rather towards a meaningful rejection of the limits that such structures place upon women.
By coming to understand the cultural logic in which the category of ‘the female celibate’ emerged in the 19th century as a coherent expression of feminist and queer identities, we will also be able to engage in conversations about how these ideas are re-emerging in the present day, from representations of asexuality and Ace and Aromantic characters in contemporary fiction, to social media aesthetic movements, campaigns and manifestoes which advocate anew for expressions of women’s of agency through celibacy.

Assessment and permitted materials

Students must fulfill and pass each of the 4 course requirements (term/B-Ed paper, presentation, portfolio, active participation) and score at least 60 points altogether in order to pass this course.

Grading scale:
1: 100-90 points
2: 89-80 points
3: 79-70 points
4: 69-60 points
5: 59-0 points

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

• Active participation in class discussions: 20 points
• Presentation (teaching activity): 20 points
• Portfolio (3 tasks relating to the course sessions): 15 points
• Term paper/B-Ed paper: 45 points

Attendance:
You may miss two lessons of this course. If a viable doctor's note is produced, you may miss a third but then need to compensate it at the teacher's discretion. If you miss more than three lessons, this will result in your failing the course, due to excessive absence.
This is an interactive course. It relies in large parts on flipped-class room methodologies and therefore requires students' regular attendance.

Examination topics

This is an interactive course with continuous assessment ("prüfungsimmanente Lehrveranstaltung"). In addition to handing in the portfolio and term/B-Ed paper, participants are expected to read all set texts and actively participate in class throughout the semester as well as hand in tasks and assignments on time.

There will be no written exam.

Reading list

Secondary Literature
Tyler Bradway and Elizabeth Freeman, "Kincoherence Kinaesthetics Kinematics" in "Queer Kinship: Race, Sex, Belonging, Form" (2022)
Benjamin Kahan, "Celibacies: American Modernism and Sexual Life" (2013)

Primary Literature:
Elizabeth Burgoyne Corbett, "New Amazonia: A Foretaste of the Future" (1889)
Marie Edwards, "The Singles Manifesto" (1974)
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, "Herland" (1915)
Radclyffe Hall, "Ode to Sappho" (1908)
Amy Lowell, "The Sisters" (1925)
Lisa Orlando, "The Asexual Manifesto" (1972)
Virginia Woolf, "A Room of One's Own" (1929)

Films:
Elizabeth (dir, Shekhar Kapur, 1998)
Brave (Pixar, 2012)
Barbie (dir., Greta Gerwig, 2023)

Association in the course directory

Studium: BEd 046/407
Code/Modul: BEd 08b.3
Lehrinhalt: 12-4686

Last modified: Mo 27.10.2025 10:26