LGBT 340 - Rural Sexualities and Genders

Global LGBTQ politics and historiography have produced a dominant narrative that celebrates urban centers and Western metropolises as the spaces in which queer life and communities thrive. However, non-normative sexualities and expressions of gender have long been cultivated in rural spaces. This course draws on theoretical, literary and cinematic works that engage with the challenges and complexities of being queer in rural spaces, particularly when compounded by poverty, racism, the degradation of the environment, and exploitation of natural resources. Furthermore, this course explores the potential of rural LGBTQ communities to offer new models and definitions of queerness that are anti-consumerist, anti-urban, decolonial and sustainable. Students are prompted to understand gender and sexual diversity as intimately tied to issues such as environmental justice, biodiversity, and indigeneity through examples taken from around the world and in upstate New York.

Credits: 1
Prerequisites: None
Major/Minor Restrictions: None
Class Restriction: No First-year
Area of Inquiry: Human Thought and Expression
Liberal Arts CORE: None

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