131-024 The Body: History, Sex & Gender

Usually 25 points of first year history, see Prerequisites, or first year gender studies, see Prerequisites.

The human body is a social construction which has its own history. Beauty, desire, and even sex, have been read into the body in different ways in the past. This subject explores the ways in which the body was read in earlier societies and how those readings have changed. In particular, we examine the development of the bourgeois body; the 19th century's inscription of new, stricter genderings onto the body; and the concomitant development of the homosexual body. Students should complete the subject with an understanding of the different readings of the body in recent and contemporary society, and of the construction of the slender body, the gay and lesbian body, and the gendered body of the late 20th century.

Class participation, and written work totalling 4000 words.

• R A Nye, 'Sexuality' Oxford readers. Oxford University Press, 1999.
• M Foucault, The History of Sexuality: An Introduction Vol. I. Vintage Books New York, 1990.