Gender-Based Biology Courses Take Diverse Forms

Introductory general biology courses and textbooks cover a vast amount of material. They tend to stress the similarities of life at the molecular and cellular levels, with Homo sapiens considered but one of many species. For students wishing to learn specifically about the female body, or about differences between the sexes, these courses aren't usually appropriate. ANALOGY: Like women's absence in past medical tests and clinical trials, many problems have not been addressed in biology, anatomy, or physiology classes, maintains Heidi Fencl, director of the Women and Science program for the University of Wisconsin system. And so arose gender-based biology courses, which explore in-depth sexual differentiation. Most of these classes are offered through womens studies departments, but some hail from biology or psychology departments. And they are quite popular, say those who teach and take them. Relates Christina Wesolek, a psychology major with a biology minor who is taking "Women's Lives, Women's Voices" at the College of Mount St. Vincent in Riverdale, N.Y., "I enjoy this class. I have taken various biology and psychology courses, but this one is different--it goes into detail about the differences between males and females. An intro class is very broad; this class is specific in this one area of biology." According to the College Marketing Guide, from CMG Direct Corp. of Wilmington, Mass., there are only 32 gender-based biology courses in the United States, most in women's or former women's colleges. The idea for biology courses that address female biology or sex differences grew out of dissatisfaction with the equating of "human" with "male" that pervaded life science textbooks and teachings circa 1960. "All human biology has to reference a norm, or it would get lost in the particulars of each person. So for decades, that norm was the 70 kilogram standard man," says Roger Persell, a professor of biology at Hunter College in New York City. Physiological measurements, such as muscle-to-fat ratio, blood composition, and lung capacity were all based on this manly standard. According to the College Marketing Guide, from CMG Direct Corp. of Wilmington, Mass., there are only 32 gender-based biology courses in the United States, most in women's or former women's colleges. Gender-based biology was born in a turbulent time when issues of equality were more pressing than today. "The origins of 'Biology of Women' courses go back to the late '60s and early '70s, with the women's health movement, the taking-back-our-bodies idea. Initially, these were activist courses to help women understand their bodies, the types of courses where women took mirrors and speculums and looked at themselves," relates Debbie Wygal, a professor of biology at the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, Minn., who teaches "Biology of Women" and is writing a textbook on the subject. If gender-based biology courses followed in the wake of the women's movement, the tide has been sustained more recently by the belated awakening of the medical research community to the fact that slightly more than half of the population has two X chromosomes (see Commentary on page 14). "In many cases, diseases or problems that affect women have not been well studied. For example, women have not been included in many drug tests. Well into the 1990s, we're seeing a push to get women included," says Heidi Fencl, director of the Women and Science program for the University of Wisconsin system. EXISTING COURSES: "The material can be integrated with existing courses," says Jeffrey Blaustein, a professor of neuroscience and behavior at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. But with apologies to Bob Dylan, the times, they are a-changing. "Several medical schools and graduate schools have instituted women's health subsections. There is more interest in gendered biology throughout the [United States], as well as the idea of teaching health of women [and] health of men," says Catherine Didion, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based American Women in Science. And that interest in the medical field has trickled down to undergraduate institutions. "There's an analogy to classes here. Like medical tests, a lot of problems have not really been looked at. Knowledge pertaining to the female body is not included as normal in biology or anatomy and physiology classes," observes Fencl. "Biology of Women" courses also formed to counter perceived "embedded messages" in the language of traditional biology. For example, an analysis of medical textbooks shows that "women's bodies have been explained through social metaphors [such as] industrial production; the body is like a factory, designed to produce babies; every menstrual period, therefore, is a failure of production; and menopause means the factory is kaput, obsolete," says Paula A. Treichler, a professor of medical humanities and social sciences at the University of Illinois College of Medicine in Urbana-Champaign. An oft-related example of "gendered metaphors in science" is the depiction of "sperm as an aggressive warrior marching off to fertilize the passive egg," says Wygal. Some feminists claim that the use of such language has discouraged research into the egg. On the cellular and molecular front, objections have been raised to the term "housekeeping genes" that have nonspecialized functions, designation of sexes in bacteria, and terms such as "daughter cells" and "megaspore mother cells." E. Sloane, Biology of Women, New York, Delmar Publishers, 1993. D. Blum, Sex on the Brain: The Biological Differences Between Men and Women, New York, Penguin Press, 1998. C.M. Belk et al., editors, The Second X: The Biology of Women, New York, Harcourt Brace, 1998. B. Spanier, Im/Partial Science: Gender Ideology in Molecular Biology, Indiana University Press, 1995. J.R. Harris, Our Bodies, Our Selves, Boston Women's Health Book Collective, The Nurture Assumption, New York, Free Press, 1998. P. Treichler et al., editors, The Visible Woman: Imaging Technologies, Science, and Gender, New York University Press, 1998. Proponents of "Biology of Women" courses maintain that there simply isn't time to cover all of the topics of interest in the typical information-packed introductory biology course. "There is so much material that is not included in most (basic biology) courses, to say you'll just add it to other material runs into the limited-time problem," says Fencl. But beyond basic biology, courses can and do cover differences between the genders. "The material can be integrated with existing courses. A couple of people here work on sexual differentiation in the brain, and we all incorporate that work into graduate seminars, undergraduate seminars, and courses such as basic neurobiology and physiology," says Jeffrey Blaustein, a professor of neuroscience and behavior at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. And Alan Magid, a lecturer in human anatomy and physiology at Durham Technical Community College in Durham, N.C., says that he routinely points out differences between the sexes as he discusses each organ system. In a general biology course, a gender-conscious approach can be misleading if not presented as part of an overall picture of how life works. "Many women come out of these courses thinking that there is female and male biology, and we have nothing in common," says Persell. The introductory biology class that he teaches focuses on the biological similarities between men and women. For example, he shows students electrodes that measure the physiological changes associated with orgasm, and from viewing the data, "they can't tell if it's happening to a man or a woman." Persell then discusses the evolutionary import, in terms of natural selection, of orgasm in both sexes. This approach of recognizing both sexes, yet not presenting them as polar opposites, earned his course a designation as fulfilling the "university's pluralism and diversity curriculum requirement for undergraduates in the area of gender," Persell reports. "Biology of Women" courses tend to focus on the reproductive system and health concerns. Consider this catalog description: "Topics include reproductive anatomy; the menstrual cycle and its hormonal control; aspects of sexual function; contraception; pregnancy; childbirth; lactation; breast cancer, infertility and other gynecological problems; and menopause. "But this type of course content, although valuable, does not necessarily arm a student with biological knowledge, Persell says. Students "can use speculums to view themselves, but [they] have no deeper understanding of their own biology. If feminists want to move forward, new studies on behavioral genetics and endocrinology are all going to have to be brought in" to these courses, he adds. Photo: Bob Rashid WIDE-RANGING COURSE: Marion Field Fass, an associate professor of biology at Beloit College in Beloit, Wis., shown here with student Angela Moten, teaches "Making Women Healthier: Biology, Culture, and International Human Rights." An example of an area of recent biological research that gets to the very heart of the concept of sex differences is genetic imprinting--the phenomenon of a disease or trait being different if inherited from the father vs. the mother. Yet none of the professors interviewed for this article who teach introductory-level courses discusses this, reserving it for genetics classes. The content and emphasis of a gender-based biology course depend to an extent on which department offers it. Growing in popularity is the interdisciplinary approach that weaves biology with social sciences and/or humanities. For example, Marion Field Fass, an associate professor of biology at Beloit College in Beloit, Wis., is teaching "Making Women Healthier: Biology, Culture, and International Human Rights" for the first time this January, with professor of anthropology Nancy Krusko. About 25 percent of the course content will be biology. "We will look at physical development and reproduction, aging, and diseases as they are manifest in women, particularly breast cancer, AIDS, and heart disease," she explains. But the catalog description also includes phrases not seen in a typical Bio 101 listing: "This course will look at the power of information and the politics of empowerment in constructing women's health .... [W]e will focus upon the role of equality and human rights as guarantors of health." "Women's Lives, Women's Voices," offered at the College of Mount St. Vincent in Riverdale, N.Y., is taught by faculty in biology, psychology, and English. "We start with three weeks discussing how one develops a gender and sexual identity," says professor of biology Patricia Grove, who shares teaching responsibilities with Barbara Smith, assistant professor of English and Mary Fuller, assistant professor of psychology. The introduction includes the study of chromosomes, endocrinology, and development of the reproductive system, with tangential mention of male physiology. "Psychological perspectives and selected readings of poetry and prose complement the biology," she adds. Specific topics covered include female genital mutilation, workplace harassment, contraception, and spirituality. Courses offered by womens studies departments also tend to be eclectic and, like interdisciplinary efforts, do not apply toward a biology major. "Women, Biology, and Health," in the womens studies department at the State University of New York at Albany, fulfills a natural science general education requirement. Associate Professor Bonnie Spanier describes her philosophy in teaching the course. "Most young women do not know enough about their own physiology to understand their own health issues. To be a healthy woman I believe you also have to understand sexism, racism, class bias, and heterosexism [and to appreciate] how much our health is shaped by societal forces. I want to empower our students in science, to motivate the anti-science ones and activate the science ones to feminism." Biological topics covered include nutrition; exercise; the skeletal, respiratory, and cardiovascular systems; pregnancy; substance abuse; and infection. GREAT TIME: Research scientist Betsy Brown, who teaches a Biology of Women course at Colby College, calls this "a wonderful time to teach" because students can concentrate on an unusual and narrow area. Gender-based courses offered from biology departments may be slated for nonmajors or majors. At Colby College in Waterville, Maine, "Biology of Women" is an intense experience in January that satisfies a distribution requirement for a nonmajors science course. Research scientist Betsy Brown, who teaches it, calls this "a wonderful time to teach" because students can concentrate on an unusual and narrow area. The course focuses on reproduction, with a small amount of material on the male. "My goal is to empower students to find information about their own health in the future, and to be comfortable with science. I want to train them to become critical thinkers, and to understand how to evaluate information. These are all things you'd want to do with any science course," she adds. And at the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, Minn., "Biology of Women" proved so popular among nonmajors taking it to fulfill a requirement that it became a majors course too. "Our course grew out of a curriculum review 10 years ago. One reviewer said, 'This is a women's college, why aren't you teaching the biology of women?' It sounded like fun," says professor of biology Debbie Wygal. So eight years ago, when the department revamped the majors curriculum to offer theme-based courses, "Biology of Women" seemed perfect. "It made sense. Why were nonmajors getting this wonderful course, but not majors? So our first semester of the two semester intro biology course became the Biology of Women," Wygal says. The majors version is slightly more quantitative. SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES: An introductory biology course that Roger Persell teaches at Hunter College stresses similarities in males and females because, "Many women come out of these [gender-based] courses thinking that there is female and male biology, and we have nothing in common." Because of its roots, the very idea of gender-based biology courses is tinged with political overtones. Already a certain unease has struck the womens studies community as other disciplines, such as political science, psychology, and sociology, are offering courses in areas that have been considered their turf. Now biology is increasingly falling into that category, and appropriately so, argues Persell. "To me, none of this stuff makes as much sense without biology as with it. Biology expands our options in our exploration of these fascinating subjects." Perhaps gender-based biology courses will become a victim of a planned obsolescence of sorts--that is, they may have served as a model to encourage instructors to include sex differences as a matter of course in their courses. Sums up Fencl, "I think the very long-range goal is to not have the biology of women, but to recognize that biology should encompass everyone." Ricki Lewis is a contributing editor to The Scientist, and the author of several college life science textbooks for McGraw-Hill Publishers

Gender-Based Biology Courses Take Diverse Forms

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