106-436 Lesbian and Gay Theory

Usually admission to the postgraduate diploma or fourth year honours in English, cultural studies or women's studies, see Honours entry.

This subject provides a detailed account of the historical development of the category 'homosexuality' and, by corollary, the category 'heterosexuality' in order to contextualise the challenges to those formations offered by the term 'queer'. It enables students to articulate and develop queer perspectives on issues of critical currency, for example, theories of the body, of subject formation, of representation. Taking up various anti-homophobic perspectives, the subject moves between such topics as the discourse of AIDS and the lesbian/gay interrogation of the sex/gender system; re-readings of canonic literature and the homo-erotic address of the fashion industry.