THE UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN ONTARIO
CENTRE FOR THEORY AND CRITICISM
TC9653B Queer Temporalities
Winter 2017
Instructor: Chris Roulston
Lecture times: Thursdays 9:30 am -12:30 pm
Room: SH
Office: LWH 3253
Phone: 519 661-2111 ex. 88931
Email: [email protected]
Office Hour: Mondays 11:30 am-12:30 pm or by appointment
Course Description
Is there such a thing as queer time? In recent years, much queer scholarship has
focused on the idea of queer temporalities, opposing queer time to heteronormative
time, from both individual and historical perspectives. The idea of queer time as
being "at best contrapuntal, syncopated, and at worst, erratic, arrested" (McCallum
and Tukhanen, 2011), has led queer scholarship to consider the implications of
being out of sync. From Kathryn Bond-Stockton's notion of "growing sideways" to
Carolyn Dinshaw's model of a "postdisenchanted temporal perspective" to Carla
Freccero's "queer spectrality" to Lee Edelman's critique of "biological futurism", the
notion of queer time has led to analyses of how we approach the historical, and how
we engage with questions of desire and subject formation. However, if queer time
has value as a critical tool, we will also consider whether it can continue to have
purchase in the face of the increasing normalization of the very idea of queer.
Course Objectives
This course will enable students to:
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•
•
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Develop an understanding of queer theory in relation to questions of
temporality
Understand the role queer theory plays in contemporary critical thinking
Recognize political and ethical issues in relation to queer theory
Develop critical thinking and writing skills
Reading Materials
Copies of articles will be made available at the Theory Centre
Assignments:
Participation
1 conference paper (10 mins)
1 final paper (4000 words)
Total
20%
20%
60%
100%
Evaluation:
Participation (20%): In the second part of the class, students will divide into
groups of 3 or 4 (4 groups altogether). Each group will have a leader who will help
their group formulate a discussion question to share with the rest of the class. Each
student will sign up 3 times to lead their group. The discussion question should
address the main ideas that cross the readings rather than an article-by-article
summary, but they can also focus on particular points of interest in any given article.
Students will be graded on the question, on leading the small group, and on
participation in their groups across the semester. This entails keeping up with the
readings each week.
Mini-Conference (20%): In the final class of the semester, students will present
their initial research for their final essay, allowing for feedback. Each student will
present for 10 minutes, and there will be 5 minutes for discussion. A formal essay
proposal will also be submitted one week before the conference date—allowing for
feedback from me. The proposal will not be graded but must be submitted in order
to participate in the conference.
Final Paper (60%): The final paper will develop ideas based on the conference
presentation, and will be approximately 4000 words in length.
Statement on Academic Offences
Scholastic offences are taken seriously and students are directed to read the
appropriate policy, specifically, the definition of what constitutes a Scholastic
Offence, at the following Web site:
http://www.uwo.ca/univsec/pdf/academic_policies/appeals/scholastic_discipline_
undergrad.pdf
Support Services
Students who are in emotional/mental distress should refer to Mental
Health@Western http://www.uwo.ca/uwocom/mentalhealth/ for a complete list of
options about how to obtain help.
Statement of Recognition
“Western University is situated on the traditional land of the Anishinaabeg,
Haudenausaune, Lenape and Attawandaron peoples who have longstanding
relationships to the region of southwestern Ontario and the City of London. In close
proximity to Western, there are 3 local First Nations communities: the Chippewas of
the Thames First Nation, Oneida Nation of the Thames, and Munsee Delaware
Nation. In the region of southwestern Ontario, there are 9 First Nations and a
growing Indigenous urban population. Western recognizes the significant historical
and contemporary contributions of local and regional First Nations and all of the
Original peoples of Turtle Island (North America) to the development of Canada.”
Queer Temporalities (Winter 2017)
Weekly Schedule
Week one: Thursday 5 January
Introduction to Queer Temporalities: Is there a Queer Time?
Week two: Thursday 12 January
Theories of Queer Temporality
1. Judith Halberstam, "Queer Temporality and Postmodern Geographies," In a Queer
Time and Place: Transgender Bodies, Subcultural Lives (New York and London: New
York University Press, 2005), 1-21.
2. E. L. McCallum and Mikko Tuhkanen, "Becoming Unbecoming: Untimely
Mediations," Queer Times, Queer Becomings, eds E. L. McCallum and Mikko Tuhkanen
(Albany: State University of New York, 2011), 1-21.
3. Elizabeth Grosz, "Introduction: To the Untimely," The Nick of Time: Politics,
Evolution, and the Untimely (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2004), 114.
Week three: Thursday 19 January
Notions of Pastness: Doing Queer History
1. Dinshaw, Edelman, Ferguson, Freccero, Freeman, Halberstam, Jagose, Nealon,
Hoang, "Theorizing Queer Temporalities: A Roundtable Discussion" GLQ 13:2-3
(2007): 177-195.
2. Heather Love, "Introduction," "Epilogue: The Politics of Refusal," Feeling
Backward: Loss and the Politics of Queer History (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
University Press, 2007), 1-30, 146-163.
3. Christopher Nealon, "Introduction," Foundlings: Lesbian and Gay Historical
Emotion Before Stonewall (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2001), 1-23.
Week four: Thursday 26 January
From 'Postdisenchanted Temporality' to 'Queer Spectrality'
1. Elizabeth Freeman, "Turn the Beat Around: Sadomasochism, Temporality,
History," The Routledge Queer Studies Reader, eds Hall, Joyce, Bebell, Potter (New
York and London: Routledge, 2013), 236-261.
2. AnnaMarie Jagose, "First Things First: Some Second Thoughts on Lesbianism,"
Inconsequence (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2002), 1-36.
3. Carla Freccero, "Prolepses," "Queer Spectrality," Queer/Early/Modern (Durham
and London: Duke University Press, 2006), 1-9, 69-104.
Week five: Thursday 2 February
The Sexualities of History
1. Madhavi Menon, "Unhistoricism, or Homohistory," Unhistorical Shakespeare (New
York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 1-25.
2. Susan Lanser, "How To Do the Sexuality of History," The Sexuality of History:
Modernity and the Sapphic, 1565-1830 (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
2014), 1-29.
3. Laura Doan, Disturbing Practices: History, Sexuality, and Women's Experience of
Modern War (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2013), 1-23.
Week six: Thursday 9 February
Queerness, Futurity, and the Death Drive
1. Lee Edelman, "The Future is Kid Stuff," No Future: Queer Theory and the Death
Drive (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2004), 1-31.
2. Leo Bersani, "Is the Rectum a Grave?" Is the Rectum a Grave? And Other Essays
(Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2010), 3-30.
3. Tim Dean, "Bareback Time," Queer Times, Queer Becomings, eds. E. L. McCallum
and Mikko Tuhkanen (Albany: State University of New York, 2011), 75-99.
Week seven: Thursday 16 February
Untimely Borders
1. Jasbir K. Puar, "Queer Times, Queer Assemblages," The Routledge Queer Studies
Reader, eds Hall, Joyce, Bebell, Potter (New York and London: Routledge, 2013),
515-528.
2. Judith Butler, "Beside Oneself: On the Limits of Sexual Autonomy," Undoing
Gender (New York and London: Routledge, 2004), 17-56.
3. Anjali Arondekar, "Border/Line Sex: Queer Postcolonialities or How Race Matters
Outside the U. S.," The Routledge Queer Studies Reader, eds Hall, Joyce, Bebell, Potter
(New York and London: Routledge, 2013), 547-557.
Week eight: READING WEEK (20-24 February)
Week nine: Thursday 2 March
Temporality and Queer Phenomenology
1. Sara Ahmed, "Introduction: Find Your Way," Queer Phenomenology: Orientations,
Objects, Others (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2006), 1-24.
2. Sara Ahmed, "Sexual Orientation," Queer Phenomenology: Orientations, Objects,
Others (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2006), 65-107.
3. Sara Ahmed, "Happy Futures, Perhaps," Queer Times, Queer Becomings, eds E. L.
McCallum and Mikko Tuhkanen (Albany: State University of New York, 2011), 159182.
Week ten: Thursday 9 March
The Future (Im)Perfect and the Queer Child
1. Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, "Queer and Now," The Routledge Queer Studies Reader,
eds Hall, Joyce, Bebell, Potter (New York and London: Routledge, 2013), 3-17.
2. Steven Bruhm and Natasha Hurley, "Curiouser: On the Queerness of Children,"
Curiouser: On the Queerness of Children, eds Steven Bruhm and Natash Hurley
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004), 277-315.
3. Kathryn Bond Stockton, "Growing Sideways, or Versions of the Queer Child: The
Ghost, the Homosexual, the Freudian, the Innocent, and the Interval of Animal,"
Curiouser: On the Queerness of Children, eds Steven Bruhm and Natash Hurley
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004), 277-315.
Week eleven: CLASS CANCELLED
Week twelve: Thursday 23 March
Post-Queer and Post-Future
1. José Esteban Munoz, "Introduction: Feeling Utopia," Cruising Utopia: The Then and
Now of Queer Futurity (New York and London: New York University Press, 2009), 118.
2. Patricia MacCormack, "Queer Posthumanism: Cyborgs, Animals, Monsters,
Perverts," The Ashgate Research Companion to Queer Theory, eds Noreen Giffney and
Michael O'Rourke (Burlington: Ashgate Press, 2009), 111-126.
3. David V. Ruffalo, "Post-Queer Considerations," The Ashgate Research Companion
to Queer Theory, eds Noreen Giffney and Michael O'Rourke (Burlington: Ashgate
Press, 2009), 379-394.
Submission of Proposals for Mini-Conference
Week thirteen: Thursday 30 March
Trans Temporalities
1. Afsaneh Najmabadi. "Reading Transsexuality in 'Gay' Tehran (Around 1979)," The
Transgender Studies Reader 2, eds. Susan Stryker and Aren Z. Azura (New York and
London: Routledge, 2013), 380-399.
2. Julian Carter, "Embracing Transition, or Dancing in the Folds of Time," The
Transgender Studies Reader 2, eds. Susan Stryker and Aren Z. Azura (New York and
London: Routledge, 2013), 130-143.
3. Deborah A. Miranda, "Extermination of the Joyas: Gendercircle in Spanish
California," The Transgender Studies Reader 2, eds. Susan Stryker and Aren Z. Azura
(New York and London: Routledge, 2013), 350-363.
Week fourteen: Thursday 6 April
Mini-Conference
Final paper due
Queer Temporalities (Winter 2017)
List of Readings
Ahmed, Sara. "Happy Futures, Perhaps," Queer Times, Queer Becomings, eds E. L.
McCallum and Mikko Tuhkanen (Albany: State University of New York, 2011), 159182.
Ahmed, Sara. "Introduction: Find Your Way," Queer Phenomenology: Orientations,
Objects, Others (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2006), 1-24.
Ahmed, Sara. "Sexual Orientation," Queer Phenomenology: Orientations, Objects,
Others (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2006), 65-107.
Arondekar, Anjali. "Border/Line Sex: Queer Postcolonialities or How Race Matters
Outside the U. S.," The Routledge Queer Studies Reader, eds Hall, Joyce, Bebell, Potter
(New York and London: Routledge, 2013), 547-557.
Bersani, Leo. "Is the Rectum a Grave?" Is the Rectum a Grave? And Other Essays
(Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2010), 3-30.
Bond Stockton, Kathryn. "Growing Sideways, or Versions of the Queer Child: The
Ghost, the Homosexual, the Freudian, the Innocent, and the Interval of Animal,"
Curiouser: On the Queerness of Children, eds Steven Bruhm and Natash Hurley
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004), 277-315.
Bruhm, Steven and Natasha Hurley, "Curiouser: On the Queerness of Children,"
Curiouser: On the Queerness of Children, eds Steven Bruhm and Natash Hurley
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004), 277-315.
Butler, Judith. "Beside Oneself: On the Limits of Sexual Autonomy," Undoing Gender
(New York and London: Routledge, 2004), 17-56.
Carter, Julian. "Embracing Transition, or Dancing in the Folds of Time," The
Transgender Studies Reader 2, eds. Susan Stryker and Aren Z. Azura (New York and
London: Routledge, 2013), 130-143.
Dean, Tim. "Bareback Time," Queer Times, Queer Becomings, eds. E. L. McCallum and
Mikko Tuhkanen (Albany: State University of New York, 2011), 75-99.
Dinshaw, Edelman, Ferguson, Freccero, Freeman, Halberstam, Jagose, Nealon,
Hoang, "Theorizing Queer Temporalities: A Roundtable Discussion" GLQ 13:2-3
(2007): 177-195.
Doan, Laura. Disturbing Practices: History, Sexuality, and Women's Experience of
Modern War (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2013), 1-23.
Edelman, Lee. "The Future is Kid Stuff," No Future: Queer Theory and the Death Drive
(Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2004), 1-31.
Freccero, Carla. "Prolepses," "Queer Spectrality," Queer/Early/Modern (Durham and
London: Duke University Press, 2006), 1-9, 69-104.
Freeman, Elizabeth. "Turn the Beat Around: Sadomasochism, Temporality, History,"
The Routledge Queer Studies Reader, eds Hall, Joyce, Bebell, Potter (New York and
London: Routledge, 2013), 236-261.
Grosz, Elizabeth. "Introduction: To the Untimely," The Nick of Time: Politics,
Evolution, and the Untimely (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2004), 114.
Halberstam, Judith. "Queer Temporality and Postmodern Geographies," In a Queer
Time and Place: Transgender Bodies, Subcultural Lives (New York and London: New
York University Press, 2005), 1-21.
Jagose, AnnaMarie. "First Things First: Some Second Thoughts on Lesbianism,"
Inconsequence (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2002), 1-36.
Lanser, Susan. "How To Do the Sexuality of History," The Sexuality of History:
Modernity and the Sapphic, 1565-1830 (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press,
2014), 1-29.
Love, Heather. "Introduction," "Epilogue: The Politics of Refusal," Feeling Backward:
Loss and the Politics of Queer History (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
2007), 1-30, 146-163.
MacCormack, Patricia. "Queer Posthumanism: Cyborgs, Animals, Monsters,
Perverts," The Ashgate Research Companion to Queer Theory, eds Noreen Giffney and
Michael O'Rourke (Burlington: Ashgate Press, 2009), 111-126.
McCallum, E. L. and Mikko Tuhkanen, "Becoming Unbecoming: Untimely
Meditations," Queer Times, Queer Becomings (Albany: State University of New York,
2011), 1-21.
Menon, Madhavi. "Unhistoricism, or Homohistory," Unhistorical Shakespeare (New
York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 1-25.
Miranda, Deborah A. "Extermination of the Joyas: Gendercircle in Spanish
California," The Transgender Studies Reader 2, eds. Susan Stryker and Aren Z. Azura
(New York and London: Routledge, 2013), 350-363.
Munoz, José Esteban. "Introduction: Feeling Utopia," Cruising Utopia: The Then and
Now of Queer Futurity (New York and London: New York University Press, 2009), 118.
Najmabadi, Afsaneh. "Reading Transsexuality in 'Gay' Tehran (Around 1979)," The
Transgender Studies Reader 2, eds. Susan Stryker and Aren Z. Azura (New York and
London: Routledge, 2013), 380-399.
Nealon, Christopher. "Introduction," Foundlings: Lesbian and Gay Historical Emotion
Before Stonewall (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2001), 1-23.
Puar, Jasbir K. "Queer Times, Queer Assemblages," The Routledge Queer Studies
Reader, eds Hall, Joyce, Bebell, Potter (New York and London: Routledge, 2013),
515-528.
Ruffalo, David V. "Post-Queer Considerations," The Ashgate Research Companion to
Queer Theory, eds Noreen Giffney and Michael O'Rourke (Burlington: Ashgate Press,
2009), 379-394.
Sedgwick, Eve Kosofsky. "Queer and Now," The Routledge Queer Studies Reader, eds
Hall, Joyce, Bebell, Potter (New York and London: Routledge, 2013), 3-17.