WGSS 402
Global Sex: Identities, Migration, Globalization Spring 2014
Division II Exploring Diversity Initiative
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Class Details

This course reveals how different cultures construct sexual identities, and what happens when dominant paradigms (i.e. the Euro-American LGBT model) become enmeshed in globalization, capitalism, and consumerism. Why do we find gay bears and drag queens trafficking in North American iconography flourishing in countries like Brazil and South Africa? Why does Madonna still turn out gay crowds in Indonesia and Russia? As global gay culture spreads, what happens to people with their own local conceptions of gender/sexuality (e.g., “Two Spirit” Native Americans?) How have free trade and the internet transformed queer lives, queer sex, and people’s understandings of their sexual selves? We begin with a focus on alternative gender/sexual formations around the world. Next we ask what happens when it`s not only identities that are on the move, but actual bodies. Here, we focus on queer diasporas, refugees, and migrants. Our final unit brings us into the global flows of capitalism itself to interrogate the role of consumerism in sexual culture, tackling thorny issues of gay gentrification, tourism, pinkwashing/homonationalism, global gay cinematic representations, and the neocolonial potential of NGOs. Ultimately, this class reveals that sexuality is infused in global economic and political affairs in ways that are often overlooked.
The Class: Format: seminar
Limit: 20
Expected: 20
Class#: 3609
Grading: yes pass/fail option, yes fifth course option
Requirements/Evaluation: comparative class presentation, mid-term essay, project proposal/abstract, final paper, field trip reaction paper
Prerequisites: none
Enrollment Preferences: preference given to WGSS majors
Distributions: Division II Exploring Diversity Initiative

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