ABSTRACT
We are two lecturers working in the field of women’s studies. Our background and training is in the discipline of sociology but our expertise has become increasingly diversified since our engagement with women’s studies. Several years ago we presented a paper at the Women’s Studies Network (UK) Conference. At that time we were very new to the issues raised by attempting to teach women’s studies within the context of mass higher education. Struggling with the complex and combined processes of modularization, semesterization and rationalization, we approached our task of establishing a half degree and ‘Masters’ (sic) with some degree of trepidation. Our paper for that particular conference was called ‘Women’s studies: Feminist dream or feminist nightmare ?‘. In retrospect, our experience has shown that women’s studies teaching can indeed fulfil our feminist dreams but the context in which we attempt to work with students has increasingly proven to be a nightmare. Whilst we wrote the first paper in a half finished office, in the midst of what seemed like a perpetual building site (mass education expansion), we are writing this second paper in the context of Teaching Quality Assessment evaluation and the demands placed upon us by the forthcoming Research Assessment Exercise. We feel ourselves somewhat under siege from the competing and frequently contradictory demands of teaching, pastoral care, research and administration.
