I want to tell you an old story. During my first year at Columbia, it occurred to me during a brief reverie that something was odd about the literature we were reading and how it represented women. In the margins of my notebook, I began making a branch of every book we read in Literature Humanities (aka Lit Hum), and I noted how each author in the western canon defined women over time– from St. Augustine, Boccaccio, Apuleius, Dante, to Goethe.

I remember some vague controversy my first year among instructors and administration about whether or not A Vindication of The Rights of Women should be mandated in the curriculum’s reading list. I think a mild concession was reached which allowed ...