Women,Gender,Sexuality Studies 292P - S-FemPerspectives/Indigeneity

How is settler colonialism - the process of (violently) displacing Native populations and claiming land by a colonizing population - related to gender and sexuality? And how does it connect to, and differ from, other forms of coloniality and postcolonialism? This course will examine recent writings in Native feminism and settler-colonial studies, in conjunction with social movements' engagement (or lack thereof) with indigenous and gender justice and decolonization. We will pay attention to how feminist and queer theory has and has not engaged with Native Studies, and to points of contact between these theories and activist work. While the course will primarily focus on current and recent events, we will put these in historical context by engaging a longer history of activism and resitance. Movements studied in the course will include Idle No More, Occupy Wall Street, and the Standing Rock protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline. Readings will include works by Aileen Moreton-Robinson, Glen Coulthard, Audra Simpson, Linda Tuhiwai-Smith, Harsha Walia, Scott Lauria Morgensen, Eva Garroutte, and Mark Rifkin, as well as materials produced by social movements.