Timeline
editWK 1 Tues. Sept. 9: Course Introduction •Heather Love, “Queer,” Transgender Studies Quarterly vol. 1, nos. 1-2 (May, 2014), 172-176. •Avery Tompkins, “Asterisk,” Transgender Studies Quarterly vol. 1, nos. 1-2 (May, 2014), 26-27. Wikipedia Project: introduction to Wikipedia.
WK 2 Tues. Sept. 16: Sexuality and Power: Normalizing Discourses [time of critical intervention: late 1970s] •Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish, excerpts. [CP] •Nikki Sullivan, “Queer: A Question of Being or Doing?” in Nikki Sullivan, A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory (New York: NYU Press, 2003), 37-56.
Due this week: complete the one-hour student training for Wikipedia here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:STUDENT. Create a user account. Create a “sandbox” for yourself to start playing around in (a user sandbox is a personal wiki page(s) where you can experiment, practice editing, plan out articles, or begin drafting articles before moving them into the article "mainspace” on Wikipedia—where live articles are read and edited).
WK 3 Tues. Sept. 23: Sexuality and Power: Women of Color Feminisms [time of critical intervention: late 1970s-early 1990s] •Audre Lorde, “The Erotic as Power” [1978], republished in Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider (New York: Ten Speed Press, 2007), 53-58. Learn more about Audre Lorde through Wikipedia or other on-line sources here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audre_Lorde •Anita Valerio, “"It's in My Blood, My Face — My Mother’s Voice, The Way I Sweat,” from Cherrie Moraga and Gloria Anzaldua, eds., This Bridge Called My Back: Writing by Radical Women of Color (Kitchen Table Women of Color Press, 1983), 41-45. [NB: Anita Valerio later transitioned, and you will be reading his autobiography in WK 6.] •Cherrie L. Moraga, “Bringing the Strains Together,” from Loving in the War Years (South End Press, 1983), 123-126. •Gloria Alzaldua, “To(o) Queer the Writer—Loca, escritoria y chicana,” from Betsy Warland, Ed., Inversions: Writings by Queer Dykes and Lesbians (1994), 263-276.
In class: Wikipedia Editing Basics, via campus ambassador if possible.
WK 4 Tues. Sept. 30: Gender as “Performativity”' [time of critical intervention: early 1990s] •Judith Butler, “Imitation and Gender Insubordination,” first published in 1991; this reprinted from Abelove et al., The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader (NY: Routledge, 1993), 307-320. [CP] • Nikki Sullivan, “Performance, Performativitiy, Parody, and Politics” in Nikki Sullivan, A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory (New York: NYU Press, 2003), 81-98. In class screening: Paris is Burning (excerpts), dir. Jennie Livingstone
Optional: Judith Butler, “Gender is Burning: Questions of Appropriation and Subversion” and “Critically Queer,” in Bodies that Matter (NY: Routledge, 1993), 58-80 and 169-185). [have PDFs] Assignments Due: 1) To get the hang of using citations on Wikipedia, add some new information to a Wikipedia article of your choice—backed up with a citation to one of the readings from the course thus far. 2) select your article, sub-article, or stub(s) for your final Wikipedia writing assignment and begin researching secondary sources.
WK 5 Tues. Oct. 7 Foundational Interventions in Trans Studies [time of critical intervention: early 1990s + later historicization] • Stone, “The Empire Strikes Back: A Posttranssexual Manifesto,” originally published in 1987; reprinted in Susan Stryker and Stephen Whittle, eds., The Transgender Studies Reader (NY: Routledge, 2006), 221-235. [CP] • Susan Stryker, “Transgender Studies: Queer Theory’s Evil Twin,” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, Volume 10, Number 2, 2004, pp. 212-215. [CP] • David Valentine, “Imagining Transgender,” in Imagining Transgender: An Ethnography of a Category (Durham, NC: Duke UP, 2007). [CP]
Wikipedia work: Continue compiling a bibliography on your topic. Develop an outline for the structure of your article.
WK 6 Tues. Oct. 14 Transition: a First Person Account
Max Valerio, The Testosterone Files: My Hormonal and Social Transformation from Female to Male (Seal Press, 2006).
Wikipedia work: begin writing. Consider beginning with a 3-4 paragraph lead summary that lays out the structure of your article, while working in the sandbox, and then move it over to the live site. In Class Writing Assignment: 25 minutes of writing on pre-assigned key words. You will be asked to identify and explain the significance of three of the following terms, drawing from your reading thus far: queer; performativity; trans; and 2 more terms tba. WK 7 Tues. Oct. 21 Queer and Trans of Color Critique •Cathy J. Cohen, “Punks, Bulldaggers, and Welfare Queens: The Radical Potential of Queer Politics?” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, Volume 3, 1997, pp. 437-465. [CP] •Roderick Ferguson, “Introduction” to Aberrations in Black: Towards a Queer of Color Critique (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006), 1-29. [CP] in class screening: The Aggressives (Daniel Peddle, dir., 2005, 73 min)
Wikipedia work: continue writing.
WK 8 Tues. Oct. 28: Neoliberalism and Homonormativity •David Harvey, “Introduction” in A Brief History of Neoliberalism (London: Oxford UP, 2005), 1-31. •Lisa Duggan, “The New Homonormativity: The Sexual Politics of Neoliberalism” in Russ Castronovo and Dana D. Nelson, eds., Materializing Democracy: Toward a Revitalized Cultural Politics Duke UP 2002, pp. 188-207. [CP] •Jasbir K. Puar, “Mapping U.S. Homonormativities,” Gender, Place and Culture vol. 13, no. 1 pp. 67-88 (February 2006). [CP] •Dean Spade, “What’s Wrong With Rights?” in Normal Life: Administrative Violence, Critical Trans Politics, and the Limits of Law (NY: South End Press, 2011), 79-100. [CP]
Assignment: Go the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) website for their “Americans for Marriage Equality” campaign, here: http://americansformarriageequality.org/videos#1 Watch three of the videos. Write a 500 word essay that uses the critiques of this week’s readings on this campaign. In class, we will discuss the readings and your critiques, but for this assignment I want you to take on the criticisms of Duggan, Puar, and Spade and think them through in relation to these primary sources.
WK 9 Tues. Nov 4 [Rhys/Zachary visit] Details of this week TBA Wikipedia work: finish the draft of your whole piece, and move it to the main Wikipedia site, if you have not done so (eg, out of the sandbox). Monitor the article and review any comments on the talk pages. Address comments and suggestions from the wiki community. Even though you have a whole draft at this point, you’re not ‘done’ with the assignment as you’ll continue to work on it.
WK 10 Tues. Nov 11: Queer Diasporas •Martin Manalansan IV, “In the Shadows of Stonewall: Examining Gay Transnational Politics and the Diasporic Dilemma,” in GLQ: Gay and Lesbian Quarterly (1995) vol. 2, 425-438 [CP] •Fatima El-Tayeb, “’Gays who cannot properly be gay’: Queer Muslims in the neoliberal European City,” European Journal of Women’s Studies vol. 19 no. 1 (2012), 79-95. [CP]
Wikipedia work: select two articles from your classmates and provide on-line feedback to them. Read the feedback from your peers, and edit your work accordingly.
WK 11 Tues. Nov 18: Trans* Issues in a Global Frame • Aren Z. Aizura “The Romance of the Amazing Scalpel: ‘Race’, Labour and Affect in Thai Gender Reassignment Clinics.” In Peter A. Jackson (ed), Queer Bangkok. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2011. [CP] •Farrah Jafari, “Transsexuality Under Surveillance in Iran: Clerical Control of Khomeini’s Fatwas,” Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies, vol. 10, no. 2 (2014), 31-51.[CP]
In Class Writing Assignment: 25 minutes of writing on pre-assigned key words. You will be asked to identify and explain the significance of three of the following terms, drawing from your reading since WK 6: queer of color critique; neoliberalism; homonormativity;
WK 12 Tues. Nov 25 [last class!] details TBA [queer temporalities]; [queer feeling] [queer archives]
Wikipedia work: turn in a 500 word reflection essay about this assignment. What worked well? What didn’t? Describe your experiences, pro and con. Feel free to offer recommendations on how to change this assignment in the future, if I do it again.