The most frequently assigned women authors for college courses

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Science textbooks, poetry, memoirs and literature make up the list of the most-assigned titles by women authors.
Tim Boyle | Getty Images file

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This week's question: Who are the most frequently assigned women authors in college courses?

TIME magazine has crunched the numbers and calculated the 100 women authors who appear most frequently on college reading lists.

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The magazine pulled its data from more than a million syllabi using the Open Syllabus Project; the courses included in the tally go back as far as 15 years.

A name that's likely familiar only to Writing 101 professors is at the top of the list: Kate Turabian. She's the author of "A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations," a guide that thousands of professors have deemed required reading. The second-most assigned woman author falls into the same category: It's Diana Hacker, the author of "A Pocket Style Manual" and other writing guides.

From there, classic literature makes its mark: Toni Morrison, Jane Austen, Virginia Woolf, Mary Shelley and more. The top 20 authors are included below; the full list, including the authors' most-assigned titles, is available from TIME.

The most frequently assigned women authors on college syllabi

1) Kate Turabian
2) Diana Hacker
3) Toni Morrison
4) Jane Austen
5) Virginia Woolf
6) Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
7) Elaine Nicpon Marieb
8) Charlotte Perkins Gilman
9) Mary Wollstonecraft
10) George Eliot
11) Zora Neale Hurston
12) Harriet A. Jacobs
13) Alice Walker
14) Kate Chopin
15) Jean M. Due
16) Charlotte Bronte
17) Aphra Behn
18) Susan Sontag
19) Barbara Bush
20) Hannah Arendt

A few observations:

• TIME's list originally included Evelyn Waugh. Many readers were quick to point out that Waugh, the author of "Brideshead Revisited," was a man. TIME amended their list. In a funny twist, Waugh's first wife's name was also Evelyn — they were called "He-Evelyn" and "She-Evelyn" by their friends.

• The Wollstonecrafts win for landing two family members in the top 10: Mary Shelley, the author of "Frankenstein," barely outpaces her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft, and her works on the rights of women.

• Barbara Bush makes a surprise entry at No. 19, for her book "Reflections: Life After the White House." The former first lady beats out Simone de Beauvoir, Edith Wharton, Willa Cather and other literary legends.

• J.K. Rowling sits at no. 71 for her "Harry Potter" series. That's higher than Jhumpa Lahiri, Joan Didion and Emily Bronte. (Apparently modern college courses are diving deep into the symbolism of the Golden Snitch.)

• On the full list of the most frequently assigned authors, before TIME split it by gender, men filled the first 17 spots. William Shakespeare was the most-assigned author, by a healthy margin.