All courses numbered 500 and above are graduate courses.
Undergraduates need to submit a course permit to enroll.
HIST 501 The Nature of Sex
Taught as schedule allows (consult the Course Directory)
What is natural about sex, gender, sexuality, and reproduction? This course examines a range of social science, feminist, and historical theories that try to make sense of some of the most intimate and seemingly timeless features of the human experience: the difference between the sexes, the relationship between gender and anatomical sex, the variation in sexual identity and sexuality even among members of the same sex; and the emotional and social dynamics of reproduction. Among the topics we will consider are the relationship between public and private life; the historic connections between patriarchy and capitalism; reproduction as a social and cultural as well a biological phenomenon; class, race, ethnicity, and religion as alternative sites of identity; citizenship, legal personhood and contract; the dynamics of empire and conquest; feminism; sexuality; the history of the body; visual culture; postmodernist, poststructuralist, and postfeminist ways of thinking about sex and gender; the current debates about the meaning of marriage; and the challenge presented by transgender lives.
The course is designed for graduate students but open to undergraduates with the permission of the instructor.
