Sexuality Wmn's & Gndr Studies 436 - Race, Gender, Sexuality

Fall
2019
01
4.00
Jen Manion
T 01:00PM-03:45PM
Amherst College
SWAG-436-01-1920F
BARR 105
jmanion@amherst.edu
HIST-436-01,SWAG-436-01

(Offered as HIST 436 and SWAG 436) This course introduces students to critical theories of difference in thinking and writing about the past. We will read major works that chart the history of the very concepts of race, gender, and sexuality. We will explore how these ideas were both advanced and contested by various groups over the years by reading primary sources such as newspaper articles, personal letters, court records, and organizational papers. Movements for women’s rights, racial justice, and LGBTQ liberation have dramatically shaped these debates and their implications. In particular, feminist theory, critical race theory, and queer theory provide powerful arguments about how we formulate research questions, what constitutes a legitimate archive, and why writing history matters. Students will learn to identify and work with an archive to craft a major research paper in some aspect of U.S. history while engaging the relevant historic arguments about race, gender, and/or sexuality.

Limited to 18 students. Fall semester. Professor Manion.

Permission is required for interchange registration during the add/drop period only.