Welcome to the George A. Smathers Libraries at UF! We're happy you're here and are interested in learning more about Women's and Gender Studies.
Women's and Gender Studies research takes an interdisciplinary approach to the study of gender, its function in cultures and societies, and its intersections with race and class. Some common themes within the broad subject of Women's and Gender studies include, but are not limited to, feminist theory, ecofeminism, LGBTQ+ studies, women's literature, and healthcare.
This LibGuide is an overview of how to do research within the field of Women's and Gender Studies. It is not an exhaustive list of articles, books, and databases, but rather a guide for how to find resources within the George A. Smathers Libraries at UF. For further assistance, please contact the Women's and Gender Studies subject specialist librarian.
Library research can be daunting! The George A. Smathers Libraries are home to millions of library materials, and due to the interdisciplinary nature of Women's and Gender Studies, it may be difficult to know where to begin a search. However, there are multiple ways to start your research here at UF, with friendly librarians eager to assist!
Database: an organized collection of data related to a specific topic
Primary source: an original document or object that reflects direct experience
Secondary source: a source that provides information about a topic but does not reflect first-hand experience
Tertiary source: a collection or consolidation of primary and secondary sources that does not provide analysis
Monograph: a scholarly work detailing a single subject, a type of secondary source
Heavy makeup, gaudy jewelry, dramatic hairstyles, and clothes that are considered cheap, fake, too short, too tight, or too masculine: working-class Black and Latina girls and women are often framed as embodying "excessive" styles that are presumed to indicate sexual deviance. In Aesthetics of Excess Jillian Hernandez examines how middle-class discourses of aesthetic value racialize the bodies of women and girls of color. At the same time, their style can be a source of cultural capital when appropriated by the contemporary art scene. Drawing on her community arts work with Black and Latina girls in Miami, Hernandez analyzes the art and self-image of these girls alongside works produced by contemporary artists and pop musicians such as Wangechi Mutu, Kara Walker, and Nicki Minaj. Through these relational readings, Hernandez shows how notions of high and low culture are complicated when women and girls of color engage in cultural production and how they challenge the policing of their bodies and sexualities through artistic authorship.
By offering an analysis of how violence against women has come to be named in activist, policy, and academic arenas, Violence Against Women in the US is an essential resource for students, scholars, and practitioners.
In The Language of the Heart, Trysh Travis explores the rich cultural history of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and its offshoots and the larger "recovery movement" that has grown out of them. Moving from AA's beginnings in the mid-1930s as a men's fellowship that met in church basements to the thoroughly commercialized addiction treatment centers of today, Travis chronicles the development of recovery and examines its relationship to the broad American tradition of self-help, highlighting the roles that gender, mysticism, and bibliotherapy have played in that development.
An engaging and unique survey of women in business that begins with 17th century Native American fur traders and ends with the producer of the film Top Gun. Along the way, the reader is introduced to some of the women---famous, infamous, and forgotten---who have engaged in business throughout U.S. history.
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