RLFR 217
Fierté, Sororité, Vitalité: Trans and Non-Binary Narratives of Francophone Expression
Last Offered Fall 2023
Division I
This course is not offered in the current catalog

Ten years have passed since Time magazine announced to the world with its June 2014 cover story that the “Transgender Tipping Point” was upon us. The cover spoke to a nation confronting transgender equality as “America’s Next Civil Rights Frontier.” While this “tipping point” is perhaps salient in the United States, trans(gender), non-binary, and genderqueer identities have world histories with their own vocabularies, knowledge systems, and critiques of normativities. As an important branch of feminist, gender, and sexuality studies, transgender studies continue to revolutionize intersectional inquiry and activist initiatives. In this course, students will explore the genealogical roots of Francophone trans literatures, art, and media as they overlap with fields like critical race studies, Indigenous studies, medicine and technology, carcerality, care, sex work, and entertainment. This course provides an introduction trans studies and trans of color critique and focuses particularly on the contemporary period to gives students insight into the ongoing debates that structure the field and its near future. The course will also have a strong focus on genre and medium as students engage with visual art collections (Kehinde Wiley’s Tahiti and Namsa Leuba’s Illusions), documentary film (Véronique Kanor’s Les femmes viennent aussi de Mars), serial web comics (Sophie Labelle’s Assignée garçon), podcasts (Lauren Bastide’s La Poudre with Paul Preciado), poetry and performance art (Kama La Mackerel’s Zom-Fam), short stories (Chantal Spitz’s “Joséphine” and Magali Nirina Marson’s “Je me déserte…”), and novels (Ananda Devi’s Le rire des déesses, Emmanuelle Bayamack-Tam’s Arcadie, and Abdellah Taïa’s Un pays pour mourir). Conducted in French.