ENGL 63.11 Race, Sex, Sensation

This course engages with theories of race, sex, and sensation in critical race and ethnic studies, black and women of color feminism, and postcolonial studies. How does the violence enacted on racialized, sexed, gendered subjects exclude such subjects from the category of the individual, rights-bearing human cemented in Western philosophy? How is this exclusion enacted on the very surface of the skin and distinctly felt on one’s body? Who gets to claim humanity and subjecthood, and who has never been able to make such a claim? The readings in this course give an account of how racialized, sexed, gendered subjects are made to bear histories of enslavement, dispossession, genocide, and colonialism in ways that might not always be visible, but instead are sensed, felt, and embodied. We will work with literature, performance, and art that elucidates the political, social, and aesthetic possibilities found in the nonhuman, animality, objecthood, flesh, viscera, and touch.

Degree Requirement Attributes

Dist:LIT; WCult:CI

The Timetable of Class Meetings contains the most up-to-date information about a course. It includes not only the meeting time and instructor, but also its official distributive and/or world culture designation. This information supersedes any information you may see elsewhere, to include what may appear in this ORC/Catalog or on a department/program website. Note that course attributes may change term to term therefore those in effect are those (only) during the term in which you enroll in the course.

Department-Specific Course Categories

Junior Colloquium: Course Group III