Courses

This course offers an introduction to central issues, debates, and theories that characterize the field of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Studies. Starting from the assumption that neither "sex" nor "sexuality" is a private experience or category, we will explore some of the ways that these powerfully public and political terms have circulated in social, legal, economic, and cultural spheres. We will also examine how these categories are situated in relation to other formative categories including race, ethnicity, religion, family, marriage, reproduction, the economy, and the state. Using a comparative and intersectional approach, we will read from various disciplines to assess the tools that LGBT studies offers for understanding power and culture in our contemporary world.

Full details for LGBT 2290 - Introduction to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies

Why are boys more likely than girls to be diagnosed with autism, and why are women more likely than men to be diagnosed with depression? Are there different "gay" and "straight" brains? And how does brain science interact with gender and sexuality in popular debate? Reading and discussing the original scientific papers and related critical texts, we will delve into the neuroscience of gender. In this course, we will delve into the neuroscience of gender difference. Reading the original scientific papers and related critical texts, we will ask whether we can find measurable physical differences in male and female brains, and what these differences might be. Do men and women solve spatial puzzles differently, as measured physiologically? Do nonhuman animals display sex-specific behaviors mediated by brain structure, and can we extrapolate these findings to human behavior? Why are boys three times more likely than girls to be diagnosed as autistic, and is there any connection between the predominantly male phenomenon of autism and other stereotypically male mental traits? Are there physical representations of sexual orientation in the brain, and how are these related to gender identity? And how are scientific studies represented and misrepresented in popular debate?

Full details for LGBT 3210 - Gender and the Brain

"My existence is a scandal," Oscar Wilde once wrote, summing up in an epigram the effect of his carefully cultivated style of perversity and paradox. Through their celebration of "art for art's sake" and all that was considered artificial, unnatural, or obscene, the Decadent writers of the late-nineteenth century sought to free the pleasures of beauty, spirituality, and sexual desire from their more conventional ethical moorings. We will focus on the literature of the period, including works by Charles Baudelaire, Edgar Allan Poe, A. C. Swinburne, and especially Oscar Wilde, and we will also consider related developments in aesthetic philosophy, painting, music, theater, architecture, and design.

Full details for LGBT 3550 - Decadence

Individual study program intended for juniors and seniors working on special topics with selected reading or research projects not covered in regularly scheduled courses. Students select a topic in consultation with an LGBT Studies faculty member who has agreed to supervise independent study.

Full details for LGBT 3990 - Undergraduate Independent Study

This advanced seminar centers underthought fissures within the field of Trans Studies. These fissures take the form of failed crossings between incommensurable positions. We will examine: the vexed relation between queer theory and Trans Studies, between the field's analytic of  "transing" and its originary focus on transgender people, between the specific violence faced by Black trans women and the possibility that Blackness itself might be para-ontologically trans; between turns to historical materialism and to new materialism, between understandings of gendered selfhood in the West and in the non-West; and between transmasculine and transfeminine experiences and heuristics. This seminar encourages students to view such failed crossings as generative sites in which future scholarship might take root.

Full details for LGBT 4688 - Trans Studies at a Crossroads

Seemingly timeless concepts of natural sex and gender have a history. In fact, they have many histories, some of which are only just starting to be written. This class examines the relationship between the (human and non-human) natural world and concepts of sex-gender variance in pre- modernity. It asks: How might crossing pre-modern conceptions of sex and gender with those of our contemporary moment lead us to approach cultural objects from the past differently? And what can pre-modern sources reveal about the histories behind the sex-gender diversity of today's natural world? We will pursue these questions through readings of contemporary scholarly literature on the topic and through the analysis of historical examples comprised of visual and textual materials studied in translation.

Full details for LGBT 4689 - Sex, Gender, and the Natural World in Medieval Culture

This advanced seminar centers underthought fissures within the field of Trans Studies. These fissures take the form of failed crossings between incommensurable positions. We will examine: the vexed relation between queer theory and Trans Studies, between the field's analytic of  "transing" and its originary focus on transgender people, between the specific violence faced by Black trans women and the possibility that Blackness itself might be para-ontologically trans; between turns to historical materialism and to new materialism, between understandings of gendered selfhood in the West and in the non-West; and between transmasculine and transfeminine experiences and heuristics. This seminar encourages students to view such failed crossings as generative sites in which future scholarship might take root.

Full details for LGBT 6688 - Trans Studies at a Crossroads

Seemingly timeless concepts of natural sex and gender have a history. In fact, they have many histories, some of which are only just starting to be written. This class examines the relationship between the (human and non-human) natural world and concepts of sex-gender variance in pre- modernity. It asks: How might crossing pre-modern conceptions of sex and gender with those of our contemporary moment lead us to approach cultural objects from the past differently? And what can pre-modern sources reveal about the histories behind the sex-gender diversity of today's natural world? We will pursue these questions through readings of contemporary scholarly literature on the topic and through the analysis of historical examples comprised of visual and textual materials studied in translation.

Full details for LGBT 6689 - Sex, Gender, and the Natural World in Medieval Culture