History 50:510:380 Spring 2014
Laurie Bernstein 429 Cooper Street, no. 202, x. 2716
http://lauriebernstein.rutgers.edu/
Office hours: Tues 11-12 and 1:30-3, Wed 9-11, Thurs 8-9, 11-12 & by appointment
Readings in the History of Sexuality
This course will explore historical conceptions of sexuality in the Western world with a focus on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. How have notions of sexual identity developed? How have they changed over time? Every week we will discuss three articles by historians of Europe, with some attention to U.S. research for comparison. We will also analyze primary sources to develop our own interpretations of how citizens and states not only understood but attempted to define and regulate sexual desire and practices.
Required reading:
All reading assignments for this course are available on Sakai Resources
Course requirements:
Attendance and participation (10 points)
What we do in class is not only important, but the heart and soul of our work. Students are expected to attend every scheduled class, to arrive on time, to come prepared in terms of the reading and writing assignments, and to participate in class discussions. There will be no use of cell phones or other communication devices during class: students are to turn off their communication devices beforethey come into the classroom. There are no excused absences: students simply lose 1 out of the possible 10points every time they are absent, regardless of the reason. Students may also be penalized for late arrivals, as well as for leaving midday through class without informing me in advance. Courtesy dictates that students should not walk in and out of the room during class time, and also that those who may be late or cannot attend a scheduled class should let me know via email or voicemail prior to that class. I will accept written assignments from students who are absent so long as they leave them in my mailbox or send them to me via email in a readable Word file before the start of the class on the day they are due.
Comments on the reading (30 points)
As indicated on the syllabus, students are required to have read the secondary sources posted on Sakai Resources prior to the indicated class. Ten times over the course of the semester, on the dates indicated as “options” on the syllabus, students are to hand in typed, double-spaced comments on two ofthat day’s assignedarticles that make it clear these two articleshave been read carefully and seriously considered. Comments should not echo what was read; rather they should contain informed responses to what was read with relation to the overall historical issues. Most importantly, the comments should leave no doubt in my mind that the articles were read – and in a thoughtful manner. If a student is absent, that student’s paper will only be accepted if a hard copy was left for me in my Cooper Street mailbox or sent to me via email in a readable Word file before the start of class on the day it was due. (Detailed guidelines are posted on Sakai Resources.)
Four formal reviews (10 points each)
Fourtimes over the course of the semester, students are to choose one of the secondary sources assigned for the class and hand in a four-five page review that summarizes in their own words the author’s main point (the overall argument);examines the structure of the article with reference to that argument;summarizes and considers the main primary sources on which the author relied as evidence for the article (how the author knows what s/he knows); and discusses the relevance of the article to that week’s unit. (Detailed guidelines for this assignment are posted on Sakai Resources.) Each paper is due on the date listed in the syllabus and must be handed in at the start of class as a hard copy, not sent as an email attachment.*Students who receive grades lower than C+ are strongly urged to rewrite their papers, but all students are welcome to revise what they have written. Rewritten reviews, along with the graded versions, are due as hard copies at the beginning of class precisely one week after the papers are handed back. There will be no opportunity to rewrite a review during the last week of class.
Presentation of a primary source (5 points)
One time over the course of the semester as per a schedule we will establish, each student will be responsible for helping guide the class through the analysis of an assigned primary source(s). Students will be prepared to help clarify context, meaning, and historical assumptions.(Specific guidelines for this assignment are posted on Sakai Resources.)
Final paper (15 points)
Guidelines for this paper will be posted on Sakai.
Introduction: The course and its requirements
Tuesday, January 21
Theorizing the history of sexuality
Thursday, January 23
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Thomas Laqueur, “Orgasm, Generation, and the Politics of Reproductive Biology,” in Representations no. 14 (Spring 1986): 1-41
2. David M. Halperin, “Is There a History of Sexuality?” in History and Theory v. 28, no. 2 (October 1989): 257-274
*Option to hand in comments on these two articles
Sexualities in the early modern period
Tuesday, January 28
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Thomas A. Foster, “Deficient Husbands: Manhood, Sexual Incapacity, and Male Marital Sexuality in Seventeenth-Century,” in The William and Mary Quarterly v. 68, no. 3 (September 1996): 577-616
2. Katherine B. Crawford, “Love, Sodomy, and Scandal: Controlling the Sexual Reputation of Henry III,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 12, no. 4 (October 2003): 513-42
3. Cristian Berco, “Producing Patriarchy: Male Sodomy and Gender in Early Modern Spain,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 17, no. 3 (September 2008): 351-376
*Option to hand in comments on two of these articles
*This is your last day to drop a course without a W, and tomorrow is your last day to add a course
Thursday, January 30
Read on Sakai Resources:
“A Lesbian Execution in Germany, 1721: The Trial of Records”
*Option to hand in a formal review of Laqueur or Halperin
Sexualities in the eighteenth century
Tuesday, February 4
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Ruth H. Block, “Changing Conceptions of Sexuality and Romance in Eighteenth-Century America,” inThe William and Mary Quarterly v. 60, no. 1 (January 2003): 13-42
2. Paul Peucker, “‘Inspired by Flames of Love’: Homosexuality, Mysticism, and Moravian Brothers around 1750,” inJournal of the History of Sexuality v. 15, no. 1 (January 2006): 30-64
3. Robin Ganev, “Milkmaids, Ploughmen, and Sex in Eighteenth-Century Britain,” inJournal of the History of Sexuality v. 16, no. 1 (January 2007): 40-67
*Option to hand in comments on two of these articles
Thursday, February 6
Read on Sakai Resources:
Excerpt from Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Émile (1762)
*Option to hand in a formal review of Foster, Crawford, or Berco
Sexualities in the nineteenth century
Tuesday, February 11
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Carroll Smith-Rosenberg, “The Female World of Love and Ritual: Relations between Women in Nineteenth-Century America,” in Signs v. 1, no. 1 (Autumn 1975): 1-29
2. Andrew Lees, “Deviant Sexuality and Other ‘Sins’: The Views of Protestant Conservatives in Imperial Germany,” in German Studies Review v. 23, no. 3 (October 2000): 453-476
3. Mary Blewett, “Yorkshire Lasses and Their Lads: Sexuality, Sexual Customs, and Gender Antagonisms in Anglo-American Working-Class Culture” inJournal of Social History v. 40, no. 2 (Winter 2006): 317-336
*Option to hand in comments on two of these articles
Thursday, February 13
Read on Sakai Resources:
1.Excerpt from Mary Sargeant Gove, Solitary Vice (1839)
2.Excerpt from William A. Alcott, The Young Woman’s Book of Health (1855)
*Option to hand in formal review of Block, Peucker, or Ganev
Fin-de-siècle sexualities
Tuesday, February 18
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Tracie Matysik, “In the Name of the Law: The ‘Female Homosexual’ and the Criminal Code in Fin de Siècle Germany,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 13, no. 1 (January 2004): 26-48
2. Michael Finn, “Female Sterilization and Artificial Insemination at the French Fin de Siècle: Facts and Fictions,” inJournal of the History of Sexuality v. 18, no. 1 (January 2009): 26-43
3. Roshanna P. Sylvester, “Scandal at the Severnaia; or, Sex and the ‘New Man’ in Late Imperial Odessa,” inJournal of the History of Sexuality v. 20, no. 2 (May 2011): 225-242
*Option to hand in comments on two of thesearticles
Thursday, February 20
Read on Sakai Resources:
Harriet Taylor, “On Marriage” (1832)
*Option to hand in formal review of Smith-Rosenberg, Lees, or Blewett
Tuesday, February 25
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Nancy M. Wingfield, “Destination: Alexandria, Buenos Aires, Constantinople: ‘White Slavers’ in Late Imperial Austria,” in Journal of the History of Sexualityv. 20, no. 2 (May 2011): 291-311
2. Nathaniel D. Wood, “Sex Scandals, Sexual Violence, and the Wordon the Street: The KolasównaLustmordinCracow's Popular Press, 1905-1906, in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 20, no. 2 (May 2011): 243-269
3. Christine D. Worobec, “Cross-Dressing in a Russian Orthodox Monastery: The Case of MariiaZakharova,” inJournal of the History of Sexuality v. 20, no. 2 (May 2011): 336-357
*Option to hand in comments on two of these articles
*Tomorrow is the last day to withdraw from a course and receive a tuition refund
Thursday, February 27
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Excerpt from Lucy Stewart, “Free Thought and Free Love” (1897)
2. Excerpt from Edward Carpenter, The Intermediate Sex: A Study of Some Transitional Types of Men and Women (1908)
*Option to hand in formal review ofMatysik, Finn, or Sylvester
Sexualities during wartime
Tuesday, March 4
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Deborah Cohler, “Sapphism and Sedition: Producing Female Homosexuality in Great War Britain,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 16, no. 1 (January 2007): 68-94
2. Jason Crouthamel, “Male Sexuality and Psychological Trauma: Soldiers and Sexual Disorder in World War I and Weimar Germany,” Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 17, no. 1 (January 2008): 70-84
3. Mauro Pasqualini, “From the Sexual Question to the Praise of Prostitution: Modernism and Sexual Politics in Florence, 1908-1914,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 21, no. 3 (September 2012): 409-442
*Option to hand in comments on two of these articles
Thursday, March 6
Read on Sakai Resources:
1.Excerpt from Ellen Key, “War and the Sexes” (1916)
2.Excerpt from Stella Browne, “The Feminine Aspect of Birth Control” (1922)
*Option to hand in formal review ofWingfield, Wood, or Worobec
Postwar sexualities
Tuesday, March 11
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Willem Melching, “‘A New Morality’: Left-Wing Intellectuals on Sexuality in Weimar Germany,” in Journal of Contemporary History v. 25, no. 1 (January 1990): 69-85
2. Richard Sonn, “‘Your body is yours’: Anarchy, Birth Control, and Eugenics in Interwar France,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 14, no. 4 (October 2005): 415-432
3. Carla Hustak, “Love, Sex, and Happiness in Education: The Russells, Beacon Hill School, and Teaching ‘Sex Love’ in England, 1927-1943,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 22, no. 3 (September 2013): 446-473
*Option to hand in comments on two of these articles
Thursday, March 13
Read on Sakai Resources:
1.Margaret Sanger, “The Civilizing Force of Birth Control” (1929)
2.Part II from Sigmund Freud, “Female Sexuality” (1932): 2-7
*Option to hand in formal review of Cohler, Crouthamel, or Pasqualini
Spring break
March 17-21
Sexualities and revolution
Tuesday, March 25
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Laurie Bernstein, “Politics and Surveys of Sexuality in Pre-Revolutionary Russia,” unpublished paper from History of the Present conference (March 1985): 1-10
2. Frances L. Bernstein, “Envisioning Health in Revolutionary Russia: The Politics of Gender in Sexual-Enlightenment Posters,” in Russian Review v. 57, no. 2 (April 1998): 191-217
3. Dan Healey, “Homosexual Existence and Existing Socialism,” in GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian & Gay Studies v. 8, no. 3 (2002): 349-378
*Option to hand in comments on two of these articles
Thursday, March 27
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Excerpt from “An Interview with Lenin on the Woman Question” (1920)
2. Excerpt from Alexandra Kollontai, “Theses on Communist Morality in the Sphere of Sexual Relations” (1921)
*Option to hand in formal review of Melching, Sonn, or Hustak
Sexualities under Nazism
Tuesday, April 1
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Geoffrey J. Giles, “‘The Most Unkindest Cut of All’: Castration, Homosexuality and Nazi Justice,” in Journal of Contemporary History v. 27, no 1 (January 1992): 41-61
2. Dagmar Herzog, “Hubris and Hypocrisy, Incitement and Disavowal: Sexuality and German Fascism,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 11, no. 1/2 (January/April 2002): 3-21
3. Patricia Szobar, “Telling Sexual Stories in the Nazi Courts of Law: Race Defilement in Germany, 1933-1945,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 11, no. 1/2 (January/April 2002): 131-163
*Option to hand in comments on two of the above articles
Thursday, April 3
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Hitler’s Speech to the National Socialist Women’s League (1934)
2. Josef Meisinger, “Combating Homosexuality as a Political Task” (1937)
*Option to hand in formal review of F. Bernstein or Healey (My paper is not suitable for a formal review, so it is excluded from this week’s choices)
Sexualities during wartime redux
Tuesday, April 8
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Leisa D. Meyer, “Creating G.I. Jane: The Regulation of Sexuality and Sexual Behavior in the Women’s Army Corps during World War II,” in Feminist Studies v. 18, no. 3 (Autumn 1992): 581-601
2. Sonya O. Rose, “Sex, Citizenship, and the Nation in World War II Britain,” in American Historical Review v. 103, no. 4 (October 1998): 1147-1176
3. Anna Hájková, “Sexual Barter in Times of Genocide: Negotiating the Sexual Economy of the Theresienstadt Ghetto,” in Signs v. 38, no. 3 (Spring 2013): 503-533
*Option to hand in comments on two of the above articles
*April 9 is the last day you may withdraw from a class
Thursday, April 10
Read on Sakai Resources:
1.Excerpt from I, Pierre Seel, Deported Homosexual
2.Soviet wartime laws (1944)
*Option to hand in formal review of Giles, Herzog, or Szobar
Post World War II sexualities in Red Russia
Tuesday, April 15
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Edward D. Cohn, “Sex and the Married Communist: Family Troubles, Marital Infidelity, and Party Discipline in the Postwar USSR, 1945-64,” in Russian Review v. 68, no. 3 (July 2009): 429-450
2. Amy E. Randall, “‘Abortion Will Deprive You of Happiness!’: Soviet Reproductive Politics in the Post-Stalin Era,” in Journal of Women’s History v. 23, no. 3 (Fall 2011): 13-38
3. Dan Healey, “Comrades, Queers, and ‘Oddballs’: Sodomy, Masculinity, and Gendered Violence in Leningrad Province of the 1950s,” Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 21, no. 3 (September 2012): 496-522
*Option to hand in comments on two of the above articles
Thursday, April 17
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. H.L. Small, “Socialism and Sex” (1952)
2. L. Aristov, “For You, Comrade Men” (1962)
*Option to hand in formal review of Meyer, Rose, or Hájková
Post World War II sexualities in Western Europe
Tuesday, April 22
Read in Sakai Resources:
1. Judith Coffin, “Sex, Love, and Letters: Writing Simone de Beauvoir, 1949-1963,” in American Historical Review v. 115, no. 4 (October 2010): 1061-1088
2. Jonathyne Briggs, “Sex and the Girl’s Single: French Popular Music and the Long Sexual Revolution of the 1960s,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 21, no. 3 (September 2012): 523-547
3. Jennifer V. Evans, “Bahnhof Boys: Policing Male Prostitution in Post-Nazi Berlin,” in Journal of the History of Sexuality v. 12, no. 4 (October 2003): 605-636
*Option to hand in comments on two of the above articles
Thursday, April 24
Read on Sakai Resources:
Homosexuals in government (1950)
*Option to hand in formal review of Cohn, Randall, or Healey
Fin-de-millénaire sexualities
Tuesday, April 29
Read on Sakai Resources:
1. Susan Wells, “Our Bodies, Ourselves: Reading the Written Body,” in Signs v. 33, no. 3 (Spring 2008): 697-723
2. David Churchill, “Transnationalism and Homophile Political Culture in the Postwar Decades,” in GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies v. 15, no. 1 (2009): 31-65
3. Lauren Jae Gutterman, “‘The House on the Borderland’: Lesbian Desire, Marriage, and the Household, 1950-1979,” in Journal of Social History v. 46, no. 1 (Fall 2012): 1-22
*Option to hand in comments on two or the above articles
Thursday, May 1
Read on Sakai Resources:
Radicalesbians, “The Woman Identified Woman” (1970)
*Option to hand in formal review of Coffin, Briggs, Evans, Wells, Churchill, or Gutterman
Final examination
1