AFRI138 PO - Critical Fabulations: Black Queer (After)Lives

When Offered: Offered alternate years
Instructor(s): J. Finley
Credit: 1

Toni Morrison once remarked, “Certain absences are so stressed, so ornate, so planned, they call attention to themselves; arrest us with intentionality and purpose, like neighborhoods defined by the population held away from them” (1988). This course attempts to pull from the margins the cultural and political expressions of black lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer people. We will examine both the uneasy structures of black queer life and extraordinary strategies black people have developed for navigating them, discussing how black sexuality is made visible and invisible in popular culture, academic, and political discourse. We will examine representations of black queer poets, musicians, political activists, and filmmakers, in which relations between race, sexuality, and cultural identity are explored. This course will contextualize and expand black queer archives, including visual representations, poetry, autobiography, political essays, fiction, music, and film, with current interdisciplinary scholarship in black queer studies.

Satisfies the following General Education Requirement(s), subject to conditions explained in the Degree Requirements section of this Catalog:
Area 3