Dr. Christine Labuski

Dr. Christine Labuski is an Assistant Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies. Before earning her Ph.D. in cultural anthropology, she earned Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in nursing, and worked as a nurse and nurse practitioner for almost 20 years. This unique background informs Dr. Labuski’s research and teaching programs, both of which focus on the medical and bodily aspects of sex, gender, and sexuality. Her courses (which include Gender and Science; Gender, Bodies & Technology; and Sexual Medicine) provide students with the opportunity to rethink their core assumptions about how sex and gender are lived. Dr. Labuski learned early that she could trust her students to meaningfully work her course material into their lives. Though she knows that this might not occur until years after they leave her classroom, she strives to always teach from this perspective. Her project, “Unmaking Assumptions: Employing ‘Universal Precautions’ In and Out of the Classroom,” reflects one way that her clinical training found its way into her classrooms. “Universal Precautions” (UP) refers to clinicians’ use of personal protective equipment (such as latex gloves) for all patients, not just those who “look like” they might harbor an infectious disease. In the classroom, UP refers to a perspective that students can adopt toward their classmates and the course material – treating everyone and every topic as if it might be present in the room. The UP perspective is designed to provide students with the capacity to discuss potentially sensitive issues frankly and in the most inclusive ways possible. By discussing topics as if the person sitting next to them might have had that experience, students can expand the contours of what categories—of people and experiences—can mean to them. By interviewing former students, her project will develop a set of UP 'best practices' in order to disseminate them to the wider VT community.