In many ways, our contemporary cultural moment is marked by an obsession with all things sexual. In this class, we will examine what such cultural obsession with sexuality entails, how it is expressed, how it came into being, and what this might mean for our present collective and individual understandings of the relationship between sexuality and culture. We will first and foremost grapple with conceptions of sexuality and culture that may be taken for granted: What is sex, and what is sexuality? Who are such commonly defined cultural notions of sex and sexuality for, and who are they by? Who is overlooked, or excluded from shaping these notions?
Over the course of this class, we will investigate how the Western interest and investment in sexuality has historically evolved in terms of scientific, social, political, as well as theoretical activities and insights. We will read, think about, and discuss written and audio-visual texts, critical concepts, historical periods and personalities, as well as political and artistic movements that have shaped relationships between sexuality and culture. More importantly, we will also consider what has been, or continues to be, left out of public discourses on sex. Our work in this class will be interdisciplinary and intersectional, where our discussions will investigate the varying forces at play in the historical, social, and cultural conceptions of sex and sexuality.