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The first assigned reading for this module is Book 1 of Aristotle’s On the Generation of Animals, however it should be stressed that you are not expected to memorize or remember all the details of Aristotle’s arguments, which are antiquated and complex! You are simply being asked to read Book 1 of Aristotle’s treatise inContinue reading “ASSIGNED RESOURCES FOR GENDER AND SEXUAL REPRODUCTION”

Gendered Accounts of Reproduction from Antiquity to the 20th Century In this module we considered three ancient theories of reproduction: We then considered the ways in which ancient theories of reproduction persist in contemporary accounts of reproduction, both within popular culture and science. In particular, we saw that in both film and biological texts, theContinue reading “SUMMARY FOR GENDER AND SEXUAL REPRODUCTION”

Challenging the Male-Female Dichotomy This module has focused on the work of three authors – a historian, an anthropologist, and a biologist – who each, in their own way and with the tools of their discipline, argues that the belief that the world is divided into two and only two sexes is a political fiction.Continue reading “SUMMARY FOR ONE SEX, TWO SEXES, FIVE SEXES, AND MORE…”

“The purported independence of generation from pleasure created the space in which women’s sexual nature could be redefined, debated, denied, or qualified. And so it was of course. Endlessly.” Thomas Laqueur, Making Sex In the last module we saw that Aristotle argued that female orgasm was not necessary for conception, but Aristotle was disagreeing withContinue reading “ASSIGNED RESOURCES FOR ONE SEX, TWO SEXES, FIVE SEXES, AND MORE…”

Thomas Laqueur: The One Sex and Two Sexes Models of the Body “To be sure, difference and sameness, more or less recondite, are everywhere; but which ones count and for what ends is determined outside the bounds of empirical investigation. The fact that at one time the dominant discourse construed the male and female bodiesContinue reading “BIG IDEAS + LESSON FOR ONE SEX, TWO SEXES, FIVE SEXES, AND MORE…”

What is the erotic? As we saw in the previous module, given widespread experiences of sexual harm, some feminists have taken an overwhelmingly negative perspective on sex. Focusing on cases such as sexual harassment, sexual assault, sexual objectification, and sexual exploitation, for these feminists sex is a site of women’s degradation and oppression. Other feminists,Continue reading “SUMMARY FOR EROS”

“…Love is not a god at all, but is rather a spirit that mediates between people and the objects of their desire. Love is neither wise nor beautiful, but is rather the desire for wisdom and beauty.” Plato, The Symposium Written between 385 – 370 BCE, the Symposium is one of Plato’s most famous works,Continue reading “ASSIGNED RESOURCES FOR EROS”

Erotic Love The ancient Greeks distinguished between many different types of love. Just to name four of these: In this module we will focus on eros which, for the Greeks, referred not only to a concept but also, when capitalized, to a divinity. According to different myths Eros was either the assistant or the sonContinue reading “BIG IDEAS + LESSON FOR EROS”

[Feminism] brings to mind loud acts of refusal and rebellion as well as the quiet ways we might have of not holding on to things that diminish us. It brings to mind women who have stood up, spoken back, risked lives, homes, relationships in the struggle for more bearable worlds. Sara Ahmed, Living a FeministContinue reading “SUMMARY FOR FEMINIST FUTURES”

Western human nature is a product of social technology that reproduces the equation “nature = heterosexuality” on our bodies, architectures, and discourses. The heterosexual system is an epistemic regime and social apparatus that produces femininity and masculinity and operates by dividing and fragmenting the body: it cuts out organs and generates zones of high senseContinue reading “SUMMARY FOR GLOBAL SEXUALITIES”