This course offers students a survey of the emergent critical discourse known as queer theory. We will consider different genealogies of the discourse that will include French feminisms (Wittig, Irigaray), post-structuralism (Foucault, Barthes), writing by radical women of color (Moraga, Anzaldua, Lorde) and queer activism (ACT-UP, Queer Nation, Lesbian Avengers). These readings in theory will be applied to literary texts by James Baldwin, Djuna Barnes, Dennis Cooper, Henry James, Audre Lorde, Cherrie Moraga and Gertrude Stein. Time will be spent on early anthologies and special issues of journals that played a large part in the codification of queer theory. The different methodologies under consideration include psychoanalysis, social theory and theories of performance and performativity. The course's final section will look at recent queer critique that attempts to understand sexuality within an intersectional paradigm that is also attentive to other modes of difference including race and class. Requirements: a total of 20 pages of writing in papers of various lengths. Prerequisite: a 100-level English course, except 150. Enrollment limited to 25. (Criticism or Post-1900)

Hour: MUNOZ