Gender and Sexuality Commons^™

Male Development In Young Adult Novels: Mapping The Intersections Between Masculinity, Fatal Illness, Male Queerness, And Brotherhood, Ruth Nelson

Departmental Honors Projects

Since 2000, Young Adult (YA) literature has grown exponentially. The subgenres of cancer novels (teen “sick-lit”) and LGBTQ fiction, in particular, have experienced a recent surge in popularity. The novels in these subgenres that feature young men as the affected characters (diagnosed with cancer and/or identifying as gay or queer) are particularly interesting because of the threats that these experiences pose to heteronormative masculinity. Because this fiction is directed at an impressionable audience in the process of forming their identities, the novels’ representations of gender could have a strong influence over readers’ gender identity development. Researchers have begun exploring the …

Übermensch: A Feminist, Literary, & Artistic Rebuke To Modern Patriarchy In The Institution Of Liberal Arts Education, Virginia Valenzuela

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Projects

Übermensch: a Feminist, Literary, and Artistic Rebuke to Modern Patriarchy in the Institution of Liberal Arts Education is a multi-genre, multi-dimensional hybrid project that revels in and manipulates conventional forms of literary analysis, creative expression, and feminist politics. Through a feminist literary analysis of Tom Wolfe’s I Am Charlotte Simmons, accompanied by a creative companion of poems and personal essays, the author intends to elucidate society’s tactics of dominating, silencing and exploiting the female sex. In this way, her project intends to rationally and passionately describe the inescapable power of conformity in the lives of American college students, as well …

Passings, Lisa M. Tillmann Ph.D.

Faculty Publications

The author, a heterosexual woman, and Gordon Bernstein, a gay man, have been friends and research collaborators since 1995. In 2004, the author accompanied Gordon on a trip to his hometown of Philadelphia to conduct fieldwork and interview family members. This project ethnographically explored personal and relational opportunities and challenges associated with coming out in a family system defined by avoidant communication, hegemonic masculinity, and terminal illness.

State Of Unions: Politics And Poetics Of Performance, Lisa M. Tillmann Ph.D.

Faculty Publications

At the 2005 International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry, the author delivered a poem and slide show, “The State of Unions: Activism (and In-Activism) in Decision 2004.” The performance processed the election in the context of her research community, a network of gay male friends—marginalized by sexual orientation but privileged by sex, gender expression, race, class, and education. Audience members offered mixed responses, some praising its provocative content, others criticizing the author’s position and tone, which some perceived as hostile, even as “gay bashing.”

The Queer And The Bodily: Explorations Of Power In Women's Visionary Writing In The Book Of Margery Kempe 2014, Jayne Emerson Stacconi

Master's Theses

The provocative Book of Margery Kempe is a seminal text in the history of female authorship. Claiming to be the first written autobiography, The Book serves as a literary representation of womanhood during the late fourteenth to the fifteenth centuries when Margery was writing, and also speaks to circulating medieval discourses of religion, pilgrimage, and sexuality. Participating in medieval women’s visionary writing as a genre, Margery’s visionary power is a tool by which she is able to emancipate herself from the limiting roles of wife and mother. Additionally, by working within the conventions of visionary writing, Margery is able to …

Gender And Self-Representation In Maya Angelou's Autobiography I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings 2014, Jay-Nel Steitz

Master's Theses

A voice that has been silenced for so long has much to say. Whether still confined or set free, the statement applies equally to both. The silenced voice wants not only to tell his or her story, but to share the life experiences which in turn reveal the identities of these individuals. These silenced voices then are not those of the oppressors, but the oppressed; and when an oppressor wants to share his or her story, the oppressed wants to tell their side of it as well. How can those labeled the marginalized outcasts of society express their feelings and …

Kate 2014 Spring, Jess Campbell, Katy Major, Josh Brandon, Amelia Gramling, Mackenzie Thomas, Cassidy Brauner, Meghan Crawford, Emily Clark

Kate

Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

Alternative Mappings Of Belonging: Non Son De Aquí By María Do Cebreiro And Rasgado By Lila Zemborain, Mariela Méndez

Latin American, Latino and Iberian Studies Faculty Publications

This essay examines the travels of the poetic speakers in two poetry collections: by the Argentinean writer Lila Zemborain, and by the Galician poet and critic María do Cebreiro, to postulate a revision of notions of belonging in its intersection with gender and space. Rasgado (2006) is a sort of poetic diary written by Lila Zemborain, who resides in New York, responding as both insider and outsider to the World Trade Center attacks on 11 September 2001. María do Cebreiro's book, Non son de aquí (2008) similarly follows the path of a nomadic speaker intent on redefining the terms of …

Feeling The Fleshed Body: The Aftermath Of Childhood Rape [Thesis], Brenda Downing

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The point of propulsion for this research is my raped and censured body with its somatic aftermath narrative. This doctoral research project is a feminist and creative investigation that sought to uncover and articulate the long term somatic impacts of childhood rape as they manifest in the adult female body. I employed a multi-modal, complementary, and embodied methodology using a combination of autoethnography, somatic inquiry, writing-as-inquiry, and performance-making-as inquiry. In addition to my autoethnographic explorations, I gathered information from other women raped in childhood, as well as information from women’s healthcare professionals. Drawing on the autoethnographic and participant information gathered, …

Greyhound, 1984, Lisa K. Sandlin

Writer’s Workshop Faculty Publications

In "Greyhound, 1984," fiction writer Lisa Sandlin grabs and holds onto the reader with terse, rhythmic language, unique imagery, and a story that's both unsentimental and poignant.

5th Annual Rainbow Book Fair, Sarah Chinn

Center for LGBTQ Studies (CLAGS)

Each year, the Rainbow Book Fair grows larger and more exciting: as the largest LGBT book expo in North America, the RBF is the place to learn about new trends in queer publishing. Exhibitors at the Fair range from academic presses to romance and erotica, from trade presses to art books and literary journals and beyond: it’s the Fair’s goal to represent the amazing variety of queer and trans writers and publishers.

Speculation And The Emotional Economy Of 'Mansfield Park', Laura Vorachek

English Faculty Publications

At the midpoint of Mansfield Park (1814), the Bertram family dines at the Parsonage, and card games make up the after dinner entertainment. The characters form two groups, with Sir Thomas, Mrs. Norris, and Mr. and Mrs. Grant playing Whist, while Lady Bertram, Fanny, William, Edmund, and Henry and Mary Crawford play Speculation, This scene is central not only because Speculation reveals certain characters' personalities, but also because another type of “speculation” occurs during the game as the players contemplate or conjecture about one another. Moreover, “speculation” in the sense of gambling functions as a metaphor for the vicissitudes of …

Kate 2012, Sarah Mcelroy, Amy Kepple Strawser, Brittany Ivy Dorow, Christine Famery, Jessica Campbell, Leslie Willis, Hannah Biggs, Jeff Vasiloff, Carina Drakes, Jennifer Russell, Chelsea Musselman, Sarah Fernando, Sneha Fernando, Becky Woodruff, Jennifer Rish, Ameila Moody, Cyrena Sbib, Meghan Crawford, Chelsea Fuller, Ellie Detrich, Jennifer Hunter, Jacqyln Schott, Katelyn Hanzel, Curtis Haker, Leah Driscoll, Kate M. Carey, Brittany Fisher, Tammy Birk, Niki Calvaruso, Wes Jamison, Alison Kennedy, Chelsa Musselman, Alyssa Mazey, Kristina Fedeczko

Kate

Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

Kate 2011, Hannah Biggs, Niki Calvaruso, Rae Reed, Jennifer Rish, Jennifer Russell, Julie York

Kate

Each year, Kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

Labor Pains In The Academy, Lisa M. Tillmann Ph.D.

Faculty Publications

This piece offers autoethnographic reflections on crossroads to which many academics come: whether to seek (or postpone or avoid) parenthood and when. The author deeply explores the personal (her own trajectories from daughter and sister to potential mother and from graduate student to full professor) in order to reflect on structural constraints associated with graduate education, the academic job market, and institutional policies and politics.

Dangerous Women: Vera Caspary’S Rewriting Of 'Lady Audley’S Secret' In 'Bedelia', Laura Vorachek

English Faculty Publications

Considering Vera Caspary's Bedelia as a reimagining of Mary Elizabeth Braddon's Lady Audley's Secret allows for a new critical interpretation that refutes the typical view of Bedelia as reinforcing traditional gender roles. Instead, Caspary critiques World War II America by bringing Victorian concerns with female roles into the twentieth century.

Focusing On Black Queer Writing: Clags At The Fire & Ink Cotillion Iii In Austin Texas, Shawn(Ta) Smith-Cruz

Center for LGBTQ Studies (CLAGS)

On October 8-11th, 2009, an historic event occurred in Austin, Texas. The Fire & Ink III: Cotillion brought together LGBT writers and artists of African descent from around the nation and beyond. In 2002, its founding year, Thomas Glave, editor of Our Caribbean: A Gathering of Lesbian and Gay Writing from the Antilles (Duke University Press) and author of The Torturer's Wife (fiction), provided the keynote, later published in both his essay collection, Words to our Now as well as the Summer 2003 issue of Callaloo (literary journal) under the name: "Fire and Ink: Toward a Quest for Language, History …

A Beautiful People, Arianne Benford

Center for LGBTQ Studies (CLAGS)

We are a beautiful people. People of the drum and open spirit. People with the strength to live our lives that bring us one-step closer to whole. We are beautiful when we constantly push and pull at the traditional American social fabric by just being ourselves.

Kate 2010, Kathlene E.E. Boone, Wes Jamison, Alison Kennedy, Meredith Lum, Jenn Johnston, Kathleen Kishman, Morgan Ritchie, Evelyn Davis, Tony Degenaro

Kate

Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

Reclamation: The Value Of Black Gay Writing Lgbtq Studies Panel, Lisa C. Moore

Center for LGBTQ Studies (CLAGS)

How gratifying to see a packed house on October 14, 2008 for a discussion of Reclamation: The Value of Black Gay Writing! Co-sponsored by CLAGS and Freedom Train Productions (www.freedomtrainproductions.org), the panel of scholars—Terry Rowden, Professor of African-American Literature, College of Staten Island (CUNY), Jafari Sinclaire Allen, Assistant Professor of Anthropology and African-American Studies/American Studies, Yale University, La Marr Jurelle Bruce, Ph.D. student, African-American/American Studies, Yale University—and me, publisher Lisa C. Moore (Redbone Press) came to discuss the impact of black gay writers on the community and academia... and to bear witness, reclaim and critique the work within the first …

Kate 2009 Spring, Brianna Mcpherson, Courtney Stein, Derrica Brown, Christine Horvath, Clair Augustine, Laura Wetzel, Rachel Ward, Kristina Kirkland, Breanna Watzka

Kate

Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

Kate 2008 Spring, Megan Hatfield, Jennifer Roberts, Michael Wise, Sojourner Truth, Allison Bradley, Randi Hopkins, Afton Gladman, Fahmiya Ismail, Caroline Clippinger, Bonita Fee, Celeste Kaitsa, Courtney Childers, Adena Griffith, Tiffany Rettig

Kate

Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

Dancing On The Edge Of Silence : Steps Towards Articulating The Experience Of Childhood Rape, Brenda Joy Downing

Theses : Honours

The experience and aftermath of male sexual violence is a lived reality for many girls and women. This qualitative study explores the subjective experience of childhood rape and its long-term impact focusing in particular on the implications of the silencing that continues to surround what is a deeply-felt and traumatic experience with profound life-altering consequences. The study thematically and theoretically reads the subjective experience of childhood rape within current feminist understandings of rape as a crime of violence and form of social control through the use of evocative autoethnographic writing and an exegesis.

Kate 2007 Spring, Jen Roberts, Amber Robertson, Chrysm Harcalvel, Glenna Jackson, Jen Knox, Julie Eaton, Celeste Kaitsa, Laine Bair, Janice Windborne, Jenna Brader, Kelly Givens, Brittany Craver, Sarah Martindell, Colleen Deel

Kate

Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

Masculine Fecundity And ‘Overinclusiveness’: Imagery Of Pregnancy In Wallace Stevens’ Poetry, Brian Glaser

English Faculty Articles and Research

This article reflects on the imagery of pregnancy in the poetry of Wallace Stevens. It notes that the decision of Stevens to change the use of imagery of pregnancy indicates something about a development in his inner life. The images of his later poems show a diminishment of his earlier tendency to associate birth with death which is a sign of his increasing tolerance of the envious desire to be pregnant. The imagination of Stevens matured over twenty years and the changes in images of pregnancy are a measure of that change.

Kate 2006 Fall, Jennifer Roberts, Mollie Fingerman, Amber Robertson, Laura Naso, Chris Kirk, Sarah Pyle, Bonita Fee, Alicia Ribar, Jennifer Knox, Marsha Robinson, Sue Butz, Jackie Smith, Julie Eaton, Kimberly Brazwell, Annie Mcguick, Marjorie Vogt, Colleen Deel, Ruth Garrett

Kate

"Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust"

Kate 2006 Spring, Ladan Osman, Sarah Jacobson, Mac Mcgowan, Vanessa Casella, Julie Eaton, Allison Hayes, Jennifer Roberts, Christeen Stridsberg, Glenna S. Jackson, Laura Naso

Kate

Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

Kate 2006 Winter, Colleen Tappel, Barbara Dewitt, Jen Knox, Whitney Prose, Amber Robertson, Ruth Garrett, Christeen Stridsberg, Shannon Lakanen, Mac Mcgowan, Julie Eaton, Abby Gaurd, Sarah Jacobson, Geetha Nagarajan, Jane Wu, Suzanne Ashworth, Jennifer Roberts, Glenna S. Jackson

Kate

Each year, kate seeks to:

• explore ideas about normative gender, sex, and sexuality
• work against oppression and hierarchies of power in any and all forms
• serve as a voice for race and gender equity as well as queer positivity
• encourage the silent to speak and feel less afraid
• build a zine and community that we care about and trust

On Brian Attebery’S Decoding Gender In Science Fiction, C. Jason Smith

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

The premise of Decoding Gender in Science Fiction is, as Brian Attebery states in the first chapter, that “Science fiction is a useful tool for investigating habits of thought, including conceptions of gender. Gender, in turn, offers an interesting glimpse into some of the unacknowledged messages that permeate science fiction” (1). What we have in Decoding Gender in Science Fiction is the most comprehensive analysis of gender tropes in Science Fiction from its origins in Gothic literature to today. Attebery states in his introduction that he was surprised to find there was no historical study of the development …

On Justine Larbalestier’S The Battle Of The Sexes In Science Fiction, Joe Bisz

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

Science Fiction, writes author Justine Larbalestier, has always told the tale of the battle between the sexes. The battle can be witnessed from afar, as in the grainy 1930’s letter columns in old sci-fi magazines like Astounding where quarrels over innate sexual differences were published and debated, or from up close in today’s literature. Larbalestier declares that the goal of her book is to illustrate how necessary and important this former, pre-70’s period of science fiction (1926 to 1973) is to contemporary feminist science fiction. The pre-70’s time period has been consistently ignored by critics, who fixate on …