Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Experience

This interdisciplinary course provides an overview of critical LGBTQI theories, frameworks and movements. It brings together scholarship from critical race and ethnic studies, black studies, feminist studies, indigenous studies and queer studies to carefully analyze constructions of “queer” and “non-normative” sexualities, genders, races, cultures and communities of people. Two interconnected areas of concern will shape our inquiries. First, we will examine constructions of sexuality, gender and “queerness” in relation to larger structures of power. We will ask: How are sexuality and gender produced through asymmetrical hierarchies of race, class, citizenship, ethnicity, religion and (dis)ability? How are “normative” constructions of gender and sexuality enforced and disciplined within a capitalist, colonial, heteropatriarchal context? Secondly, we will explore the potentials of “queer” movements for social justice, paying particular attention to the place of joy, pleasure and intimacy within historical and contemporary political struggles. We will ask: How are sex and eros linked to struggles for collective freedom, de-colonization and emancipatory social justice? How might “queer” movements, theories and struggles open up new possibilities for radical social change in all of our lives and movements? Throughout the course, students will be asked to interrogate their own relationships to these questions. Collectively, we will all work to situate ourselves as agents for social transformation within the classroom and our larger communities