POL. 315F SEXUAL DIVERSITY POLITICS 2007
INSTRUCTOR:David Rayside UC158 978-8087
Office Hours: Tuesday, 2:15-3:00; Wed 9:30-11:30
Teaching Assistant: TBA
THEMES:
An interdisciplinary course examining the development of social and political visibility by gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and the transgendered, in countries as diverse as Canada, the United States, France, Brazil, South Africa, and Taiwan, and the extent to which public policy and institutional practice has responded inclusively. Among the issue areas to be explored are policing,, censorship, HIV/AIDS, workplace policies, gay/lesbian marriage, parenting rights, and schooling. Among the questions to be addressed are: why have political movements mobilizing around sexual diversity when and where they have?; to what extent has the intensification of cross-national contacts homogenized the construction of sexual minority identities and political agendas?; what factors contribute to progressive state responses? In all such questions, gender, race/ethnic, and social class differences will be considered, both in the character of social movements, changed public attitudes, and state recognition.
REQUIREMENTS:
- Short Paper (firm maximum of 750 words)Due Sept. 26th * Weight: 10%
To be specified in class.
- TestOct. 29th, 4:10-5:10 pm (East Hall) Weight: 20%
A quiz, with either two essay questions, or a single essay question and a series of short “identification” items.
- Second Essay (firm maximum of 3000 words)Due Dec. 3rd * Weight: 35%
Topic to be chosen by student, though with relevance to sexual diversity in the contemporary period, including social movements arising from that diversity or policy responses to it.
- Final ExamDecember examination period Weight: 35%
A series of questions will be handed out on in late November, from which a random selection will be made for the examination. Note that the exam will be in the examination period, scheduling to be determined by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Students should not make travel plans over the inter-term period without knowing the examination timetable.
* Late penalties for essays: 3% per day, and not submittable after the official last day of first term classes.
ESSAY WRITING:
Clear, well-organized, and articulate writing is an indispensable feature of the analytical process, and this course assumes that you are prepared to work on improving your capacity to communicate in prose. The Political Science Department’s web site includes, at a “Writing at U of T” link on the left side of the home page, a brief guide to essay writing (authored by Rayside), as well as a link to a vast array of university-wide resources – at the “plagiarism” link. That essay is also available through the course web site. Each college also has a writing workshop.
WEB SITE & EMAIL:
The course will have a Blackboard web site, on which reading beyond the coursepak, media reports on
LGBT-related news, and other items will be posted. It will also be used to send announcements out to students in the class. Students must register with the Blackboard site to gain access to material there.
The T.A. for this course and I will be prepared to respond to a reasonable number of e-mails, but not necessarily right away. Each of us receives a considerable volume of messages, and you should not assume that your’s in particular requires urgent attention. Questions asking for information that is available on the course syllabus will not be answered. I regularly do not check e-mails on the weekend or in the evening
TEXTS:
Course pack (available at The Women’s Book Store, 73 Harbrod St.)
Both the Women’s Book Store (73 Harbord St.) and Glad Day Bookstore (598A Yonge St.) have excellent collections on sexual diversity, and are important community institutions.
READING LIST:
All reading listed under each topic is required reading, and much of it is available in the short term loan library section of Robarts Library. In addition to the items listed below, newspaper articles will be regularly posted on a course web site and treated as required reading. Films and guest lectures are integral to the course, and material discussed in them considered on a par with regular lectures and required reading. Unless otherwise indicated, each underlined topic will represent approximately one week.
cp = coursepak
ws = posted on web site
ol= available on line
GLOBALIZING QUEERNESS?
Capitalism, Sexual Discovery, and Visibility
cpJohn D’Emilio, “Capitalism and Gay Identity,”pp. 100-13 in Powers of Desire: The Politics of Sexuality, ed. Ann Snitow, et al. (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1983)
cpMichael D. Sibalis, “Paris,” pp. 10-37 in Queer Sites: Gay Urban Histories Since 1600, ed. David Higgs (London: Routledge, 1999)
olMatthew Sommer, “Was China Part of a Global Eighteenth Century Homosexuality?” Historical Reflections 33, no. 1 (Spring 2007): 117-33
Democratization and the Widening of Recognition Claims
cpMarc Stein, “Gay Liberation in the ‘Birthplace of the Nation,’ 1970-71,” in City of Sisterly & Brotherly Loves, by Stein (Chicago, 2000)
cpJames Green, “‘More Love and More Desire”: The Building of a Brazilian Movement,” pp. 91-109 in The Global Emergence of Gay and Lesbian Politics, ed. Barry Adam, et al. (Phil.: Temple Univ. Press, 1999)
cpMai Palmberg, “Emerging Visibility of Gays and Lesbians in Southern Africa: Contrasting Contexts,” pp. 266-92 in The Global Emergence of Gay and Lesbian Politics, ed. Barry Adam, et al. (Phil.: Temple Univ. Press, 1999)
cpScott Simon, “From Hidden Kingdom to Rainbow Community: The Making of Gay and Lesbian Identity in Taiwan,” pp. 67-88 in The Minor Arts of Daily Life: Popular Culture in Taiwan, ed., David Jordan, et al. (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2004)
Globalizing LGBT Identities and Agendas?
cpPeter Drucker, “Introduction: Remapping Sexualities,” pp. 9-42 in Different Rainbows, ed. Drucker (London: Gay Men’s Press, 2000)
olDennis Altman, “Rupture or Continuity? The Internationalization of Gay Identities,” Social Text, no. 48 (Autumn 1996): 77-94
Diasporic Communities and Racial Minorities in the West
cpCathy Cohen, “Contested Membership: Black Gay Identities and the Politics of AIDS,” pp. 362-94 in Queer Theory/Sociology, ed. Steven Seidman (Blackwell, 1996)
olAlain Dang and Cabrini Vianney, Living in the Margins: A National Survey of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Asian and Pacific Islander Americans (N.Y.: National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Policy Institute, 2007)
ws?Amir Hussain, article for Rayside/Wilcox book
PUBLIC RECOGNITION OF SEXUAL DIVERSITY
Shifts in Public Opinion
olPew Global Attitudes Project, “Views of a Changing World, June 2003,” ( pp. 112-117 of report.
olPatrick Egan and Kenneth Sherrill, “Neither an In-Law Nor an Outlaw Be: Trends in Americans’ Attitudes Toward Gay People,” Public Opinion Pros (2005)
wsAmy Langstaff, “A Twenty-Year Survey of Canadian Attitudes on Homosexuality and Gay Rights,” in Religion, Sexuality, and Politics in Canada and the United States, ed. David Rayside and Clyde Wilcox (forthcoming)
Pride Marches, Media Representations, Visibility in the Public Square
wsRex Wockner, “Pride Around the World,” The Bottom Line (20 July 2007)
wsConor O’Dwyer and Katrina Z.S. Schwartz, “Return to (Illiberal) Diversity? Anti-Gay Politics and Minority Rights After EU Enlargement,” unpublished paper (2007)
cpKeith Boykin, “Homothugs, Helmets and Hip Hop,” pp. 219-37 in Beyond the Down Low: Sex, Lies, and Denial in Black America, by Boykin (N.Y.: Carroll and Graf, 2005)
cpCarl Stychin, “Queering the Third Way: Sexuality and Citizenship in ‘New Britain,’” pp. 25-47 in Governing Sexuality, by Stychin (Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2003)
Policing, Criminalization, and Censorship
cpGerald Hannon, “Raids, Rage and Bawdyhouses,” pp. 273-94 in Flaunting It? A Decade of Gay Journalism from The Body Politic (Toronto: Pink Triangle Press, 1982)
cpTom Warner, “Queer Community Standards and Queer Spaces,” pp. 266-304 in Never Going Back, by Warner (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002)
cpLi Yinhe, “Regulating Male Same-Sex Relationships in the People’s Republic of China,” in Sexual and Sexuality in China, ed. Elaine Jeffrey’s (N.Y.: Routledge, 2006)
AIDS Policy and Practice
cpDennis Altman, “Imagining AIDS: And the New Surveillance,” pp. 68-85 in Global Sex, by Altman (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001)
ol?Varun Gauri and Evan S. Lieberman, “Boundary Institutions and HIV/AIDS Policy in Brazil and South Africa,” Studies in Comparative International Development 41, no 3 (Fall 2006): 47-73
Workplace Recognition
olHuman Rights Campaign, The State of the Workplace 2007, for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Americans (Washington, D.C.: HRC, 2007)
wsGerald Hunt and Jonathon Eaton, “We Are Family? Labour’s Response to Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered Workers,” in Equity, Diversity, and Canadian Labour, ed. Gerald Hunt and David Rayside (Toronto: UTP, forthcoming)
cpKylar W. Broadus, “The Evolution of Employment Discrimination Protections for Transgender People, pp. 93-101 in Transgender Rights, ed. Paisley Currah, et al (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006)
Marriage and Relationship Recognition
wsDavid Rayside, Queer Inclusions, Continental Divisions (Toronto: UTP, forthcoming), chap. 4
olLois Harder, “Rights of Love: The State and Intimate Relationships in Canada and the United States,” Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State and Society 14, no 2 (2007): 155-81
Parenting Rights and Obligations
wsDavid Rayside, Queer Inclusions, Continental Divisions, chaps. 6, 7
cpTaylor Flynn, “The Ties That (Don’t) Bind: Transgender Family Law and the Unmaking of Families,” pp. 32-50 in Transgender Rights, ed. Paisley Currah, et al (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006)
Limits to Acceptance: School Recognition of Sexual Diversity
wsDavid Rayside, Queer Inclusions, Continental Divisions, chaps. 8, 9
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