| CODE | GRS3004 | ||||||||
| TITLE | Queering Knowledge | ||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 03 - Years 2, 3, 4 in Modular Undergraduate Course | ||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | 6 | ||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 4 | ||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | Gender and Sexualities | ||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | This study-unit takes a critical approach to gender and sexuality normativities through a queer theoretical stance. Thus using Queer Theory, it investigates the very creation of binaries and dichotomies, such as heteronormativity and heterosexuality, and the different values and connotations being attached to various genders and sexualities. It will first and foremost introduce the students to the critical themes of queer theory and how a queer perspective can be cultivated to question taken-for granted assumptions of normalcy. It will guide the students in making use of queer theory to expose binarisms and unravel dominant and marginalising understandings of gender and sexuality, as well as other social differences including ableness, class and race. Adopting an intersectional approach, the students will be equipped with skills to recognise that identities are not one-dimensional or static but fluid and multiple as differences such as race, class, nationality, ableness and age intersect with gender and sexuality. This will guide the students’ understanding of how assumptions and normative practices structure the production of knowledge whilst suppressing or devaluing knowledge deriving from non-dominant social differences. The study unit will provide opportunities to make strange or “queer” foundational assumptions whilst defamiliarizing the universal and naturalised order of things, such as the medicalised discourse and rhetorical practices in health and medicine that operate through a heteronormative medicalized lens, and how these perpetuate the pathologization of non-normative bodies. Study-Unit Aims: - To introduce the students to the main questions within queer theory and its related theories, namely existentialism, black feminist thought and post-structuralism; - To offer new and alternative visions to analyse social differences and structures around the individualised, behaviour and desicions-oriented HIV prevention and structural issues like racism, poverty and stigma. - To critically challenge the hetero/homosexual binary that organises thinking about gender and sexuality whilst helping the students develop a critical lens that enables them to challenge and deconstruct other binary formations such as male/female, rational/irrational, mind/body; - To enable analysis of institutional practices and discourses that produce knowledge, about gender and sexuality and their interrelation with power, and how these practices repress non-dominant social differences. - To challenge normative notions of gender and sexuality that are central to compulsory ablebodiedness and hetetrosexuality. Learning Outcomes: 1. Knowledge & Understanding: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - Demonstrate their understanding of what is meant by a queer method and how it can be deployed in societal contexts; - Critically elaborate on the relevance of queer studies to disrupt narrow understandings and beliefs about human experience and knowledge; - Describe critical, imaginative and creative ways of deconstructing taken for granted binary divisions and systems of domination that contribute to the production of ‘normalcy’; - Identify how ableist ideologies and normative views of the body and sex deny disabled people a sexual culture. - Demonstrate their take up of a queer way of thinking and development of a critical lens that enables them to shed light on blindspots that characterise thinking and knowledge production. 2. Skills: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - Analyse heterosexuality as a social organising force and how norms are constructed, normalised and perpetuated in the very fabric of people’s lives and experiences; - Interrupt and interrogate binary understandings of gender and sexual identities in favour of more accurate and affirming conceptualisations; - Question how sexual belief systems and normative assumptions intersect with other social differences and systems of oppression; - Use a queer lens to critique and analyse different cultural artifacts and practices. - Critically examine the normalising power of the assumption of cisnormativity and heterosexuality. Main Text/s and any supplementary readings: Main Texts: - Gordon, C. (2021). Queer Rhetorics of Resistance in HIV Healthcare in Rhodes and Alexander (Eds), Queering the Rhetoric of Health and Medicine. NY:Routledge. - Manthey, K., Novotyny, M. & Cox, M. (2021). Queering the Rhetoric of Health and Medicine in Rhodes and Alexander (Eds) The Routledge Handbook of Queer Rhetoric. NY:Routledge. - Hubrig, A. (2021). Chronicity Rhetoric as Queercrip Activism in Rhodes and Alexander (Eds). The Routledge Handbook of Queer Rhetoric. NY: Routledge. - Eckert, P. & Podesva R. (2021). Non-binary approaches to gender and sexuality in Angouri and Baxter (Eds) The Routledge Handbook of Language, Gender and Sexuality. New York: Routledge. - Ericsoson, S. (2021). Gender and Sexuality Normativities in Angouri and Baxter (Eds) The Routledge Handbook of Language, Gender and Sexuality. NY:Routledge. Supplementary Readings: - Butler, J. (1990). Gender Trouble. New York, NY: Routledge. - Butler, J. (2004). Undoing Gender. New York, NY: Routledge. - Foucault, M. (1989). The Archaeology of Knowledge. New York, NY: Routledge. - Jagose, A. (1997). Queer Theory: An Introduction. New York, NY: New York University Press. - Rubin, G.S. (2011). Deviations: A Gayle Rubin Reader. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. - Seidman, S. (1997). Difference Troubles: Queering Social Theory and Sexual Politics. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. - Spargo, T. (1999). Foucault and Queer Theory. Cambridge, UK: Icon Books. |
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| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture | ||||||||
| METHOD OF ASSESSMENT |
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| LECTURER/S | Beverley Abela Claire Lucille Azzopardi Lane (Co-ord.) Thea Debono Angele Deguara Ryan Grima Tyrone Grima Jasser Hammami Matthew Vassallo |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2025/6. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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