Fall 2007

WGS 393 • TRANS: DANGEROUS BRDR VIOLATNS

Course Description

This course is an exploration into the media and technologies of identity, with emphasis on transgender and transsexuality across cultures and throughout history. We will: conduct a global historical survey of the practices of transsexual and transgendered people from antiquity to the present; review changes in scientific perspectives on the design and significance of the male/female body as well as intersexed and transsexual bodies; discuss gender, prosthetics, cyborgs, and the relation of the posthuman to media production; explore the function of the transsexual figure in films, pulp fiction, and popular culture. You will produce physical and/ or digital projects as well as research papers, with an emphasis on making. CONSENT OF INSTRUCTOR MUST BE OBTAINED. GRADUATE STANDING REQUIRED. COURSE NUMBER MAY BE REPEATED FOR CREDIT WHEN THE TOPICS VARY. WGS 393 AND W S 393 MAY NOT BOTH BE COUNTED. MEETS WITH RTF 331R, RTF 390N AND WGS 324.

back