D. Walker (English)
4 HU, W-INT
Full Course -- 4 Credits
Fall Semester FYSP 134-01 MWF 1:30-2:20
Fall Semester FYSP 134-02 MWF 3:30-4:20
In Western cultures, identity often tends to be defined in binary terms: an individual is either black or white, male or female, straight or gay, and so on. This seminar will seek to explore the nature of identity by focusing on texts in which categories of identity—specifically those of race, gender, and sexuality—are represented as fluid and ambiguous rather than as fixed and polarized. Examples might include Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, Michael Chabon’s The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, Jackie Kay’s Trumpet, Nella Larsen’s Passing, James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room, Amy Bloom’s A Blind Man Can See How Much I Love You, and Carol Anshaw’s Aquamarine, and such films as Boys Don’t Cry, The Crying Game, and Brokeback Mountain. We will explore the significance of such categories as biracial, bisexual, and transgendered for the ways in which we understand broader notions of sexuality, race, and gender, and also for the implicit challenges they may pose to notions of identity as inborn and unchanging.