ENGL 459C/ LGBT/ WGSS– LGBTQ and Other Life Writings in Different Media

Attending to important differences of race, class, sexuality, gender, physical ability, and nationality, this course probes how different LGBTQ+ writers have scripted identities and told life stories in various media.

Over and over again and from multiple perspectives, we will probe how queer expressions are conceived and understood, how very different queer writers, directors, musicians, and artists script identity, conditions of being, passion, desire, genders, and sexualities in a variety of genres, including fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, memoir, criticism and theory, film, television and song. Writers and artists that may well be covered range from Emily Dickinson (including Wild Nights With Emily and Dickinson Apple TV series) and Walt Whitman to Elizabeth Bishop (including Reaching for the Moon), Billie Holiday, Allen Ginsberg, Adrienne Rich, Alison Bechdel, Essex Hemphill (Tongues Untied), RuPaul, Billy Porter, Janet Mock Besides our readings, course work requires keeping a weekly journal in online discussions, an oral presentation, two short papers, and a longer paper and/or digital or other media production. The course is designed to help students develop close reading skills and formulate analyses of works in a variety of media. Of particular interest will be how writings, readings, and receptions queer and are queered by gender and sexual identities.

Section(s):
0101 -  Martha Nell Smith