Instructor: Valerie Lehr
Phone: X5677
Email: VLEHR@STLAWU.EDU
Office: 84 Park St., #203
Office Hours: Tuesday 1:00-2:00 and Wednesday 11:00-12:00

In this class we will explore how the social designation of "sexual other" has influenced gay/lesbian/bisexual/queer political organizing
and political thought in the United States. Specifically, we will ask how the denial of basic citizenship rights and responsibilities to gay
men and lesbians contributed to the rise of gay identity politics, explore the advantages and disadvantages of pursuing equality through
identity-politics, and examine how gay communities have been challenged to question the race, class, and gender dynamics that are
embedded within gay political organizing and transform understandings of what it means to be "gay." We will also look at how
gay/lesbian/queer identity influences participation in mainstream political institutions.

Required Texts:
Blasius, Mark, ed. Sexual Identities, Queer Politics. Princeton, 2001.
D'Emilio, John. Sexual Politics, Sexual Communities, Chicago, 1983.
Phelan, Shane, Sexual Strangers: Gays, Lesbians, and Dilemmas of Citizenship, Temple, 2001.
Vaid, Urvashi. Virtual Equality: The Mainstreaming of Gay and Lesbian Liberation, Anchor Books, 1995.

In addition, some readings will be on reserve.

Course Requirements:
1. Response Writing and Question Writing - 20% -- You will be divided into 4 groups on the first day of class. Most weeks, one group
will be responsible for writing a response to the first portion of the readings and posting it on blackboard by 4:00 pm on Monday. A
second group will be responsible for reading through the responses of the first group and having a brief conversation about them in order
to formulate some questions. They will pose them to the class and moderate a conversation about them to begin class discussion.
Occasionally, everyone will write a response that will be due in class.
2. Participation - 20% -- Class Participation - I expect that you will regularly contribute to class. You will assign yourself 50% of this
portion of your grade. In order to receive a 4.0 for this segment of your grade, you should: 1) attend class regularly. If you miss more
than 2 classes, you will receive a 0 on the class participation portion of your grade and lose the right to assign your portion of the grade;
2) engaged in class, whether by speaking or listening and, occasionally, by writing; 3) participate in conversation in a way that indicates
both that you have read and thought about the course material and that you have been paying attention to what others say; 4) respectful
of others in how you respond to them verbally and non-verbally. At mid-term, we will provide one another with a grade and explanation for
the grade. If our evaluations are different by more than 1.0, we will meet to try to understand why the grades are so different.
3. Midterm - 15% -- The essay question for this exam will revolve around our class discussion on AIDS/Queer Nation and all prior
readings.
4. Issue Analyses - 25% -- During the last three weeks of class, each student will be responsible for identifying essays on whatever
topics we choose, choosing at lead two essays to read on the topic, and working with others to write an entry for our Encyclopedia of
Queer Politics.
5. Final Essay - 20% -- You will address two questions, one of which will ask you to connect the work that we do one of the last 3
weeks of the semester to what we have read during the rest of the semester. The second will ask you to use the course readings to
discuss sexual citizenship and sexual strangers.

Weekly Assignments:
1/22 - In Class: Watch The Times of Harvey Milk. What does this film suggest about the challenges and possibilities of gay and lesbian
politics and citizenship in the US?

1/29 - Conceptualizing Citizenship and History
Phelan, pp. 11-36 and D'Emilio, pp. 1-125.
Response Assignment: Group 1 - In your own words, explain why Phelan believes that lesbigay people are sexual strangers rather than
citizens. Respond briefly to her argument.
Group 2 - Identify issues for discussion.

2/5 - History
D'Emilio, pp. 129-239 and your chapter from Beemyn, Creating A Place for Ourselves. Please note: Beemyn will be on reserve in the
library. If you all wait to do this reading until after you have finished D'Emilio, it will be impossible.

Response Assignment: All - Use your chapter from Beemyn to address the following questions: D'Emilio focuses on political organizing
prior to Stonewall to explain how a gay movement arose so quickly in the late-1960s and early 1970s. Based on your chapter from
Beemyn, what factors, in addition to political organizing, should we add to D'Emilio's analysis? What consequences might the race,
class, gender dynamics discussed in your chapter have for the later movement? Your response should be about 2 pages.

2/12 - Building a Movement
Rayside, "The Structuring of Sexual Minority Opportunities in the Political Mainstream," pp. 23-55 in Blasius and Vaid, pp. 1-105.

Response Assignment: Group 3 - What institutional forces does Rayside suggest are particularly important for organizers in the US to
understand?
Group 4 - Identify issues for class discussion.

2/19 - Building a Movement
Vaid, pp. 105-273.

Response Assignment: Group 2 -- Having read through p. 177, what do you find most striking in Vaid's analysis? Why? What does this
say about the challenge of building a movement? Does it reinforce or contradict Rayside's arguments about the US?
Group 1 - Identify issues for class discussion.

2/26 - Building a Movement
Vaid, pp. 273-403.

Response Assignment: Group 4 - From what you have read in Vaid, how would you compare her understanding of lesbigay citizenship
to Phelan's?
Group 3 - Identify issues for class discussion.

3/5 - AIDS, Queer Nation, and G/L/B/Q Activism
We will all read:
Gamson, Josh. 1989. "Silence, Death, and the Invisible Enemy," Social Problems, 36(4): 351-367. (Reserve or in the library journal
stacks)

Edwards, Jeffrey. 2001. "AIDS, Race, and the Rise and Decline of Militant Oppositional Lesbian and Gay Politics in the US," New
Political Science 22(4): 485-506. (You can access this essay on-line.)

In addition, you (along with two others) will be assigned an additional reading about which you should: 1) identify quotes that you see as
central to the author's arguments and 2) write a 2-3 page paper in which you discuss the author's primary arguments and connect them
to other course readings. In class, we will have a fishbowl conversation for the first 45 minutes of class during which you will discuss
AIDS activism and/or queer activism from the perspective of your author.

3/12 - Sexual-Identity Politics in the United States
Essays from Blasius:
Bailey, Robert. "Sexual Identity and Urban Space," pp. 231-255.
Salokar, Rebecca, "Beyond Gay Rights Litigation,"pp. 256-285.
Cook, Timothy and Bevin Hartnett, "Splitting Images: The Nightly Network News and the Politics of the Lesbian and Gay Movement,
1969-1978," pp. 286-317.
Yang, Alan, "Lesbians and Gays and the Politics of Knowledge," pp. 342-358.

Response Assignment: Each member of Group 1 will have an essay that they should read first. Having read your essay, answer the
following - What are the most instructive arguments made by your author? How can you connect them to an argument made by one
other author whom we have read this semester?
Group 2 - Identify questions for class discussion.

3/19 - Spring Break

3/26 - Comparative and International Perspectives
Essays from Blasius:
Duyvendak, Jan-Willem, "Identity Politics in France and the Netherlands," pp. 56-72
Diaz-Cotto, Juanita, "Lesbian-Feminist Activism and Latin American Feminist Encuetros," pp. 73-95.
Altman, Dennis, "Global Gaze/Global Gays," pp. 96-118.
Petchesky, Rosalind, "Sexual Rights: Inventing a Concept, Mapping an International Practice," pp. 118-139.
Response Writing: Each member of Group 3 will have an essay that they should read first. Having read your essay, answer the following
- What are the most instructuive arguments made by your author? How can you connect them to an argument made by one other author
whom we have read this semester?
Group 4 - Identify questions for class discussion.

4/2 - Politically Theorizing Homosexuality
Essays from Blasius:
Blasius, Mark, "An Ethos of Lesbian and Gay Existence," pp. 143-177.
Currah, Paisley, "Queer Theory, Lesbian and Gay Rights, and Transsexual Marriages," pp. 178-199.
Cohen, Cathy, "Punks, Bulldaggers, and Welfare Queens: The Radical Potential of Queer Politics?" pp. 200-227.

Response Writing: Each member of Group 2 will have an essay that they should read first. Having read your essay, answer the following
- What are the most instructuive arguments made by your author? How can you connect them to an argument made by one other author
whom we have read this semester?
Group 1 - Identify questions for class discussion.

4/9 - Queer Citizenship
Phelan, pp. 37-161
Eadie, Jo. 1993. "Activating Bisexuality: Towards a Bi/Sexual Politics," from Activating Theory, edited by Joseph Bristow and Angelia R.
Wilson. London: Lawrence and Wishart. (Reserve)

Response Assignment: Group 4
Group 3 - Identify questions for class discussion.

4/16 - Analyzing Issues: Marriage and Family

4/23 and 4/30 - Analyzing Issues: To be determined by the class.