lesbianhist

This course seeks to examine theories of lesbian desire and identity in relationship to historical studies of female-female eroticism. It’s central question is this: To what extent is lesbianism intelligible simultaneously as a theoretical and historical category? Given that the concept of homosexuality as an identity is a post-Enlightenment phenomenon, and given that queer theory (and post-structuralism more generally) calls into question a one-to-one relation between erotic acts and erotic identities, how can scholars reclaim representations of lesbians in the past? What is involved—archivally, methodologically, psychologically—in such a reclamation? In pursuing representations of lesbians in literature or history, how might scholars balance their respect for the alterity of the past with their commitments to the political demands of the present? How does the category of eroticism function historically, and what kind of evidentiary status does “the erotic” possess? In short, do we always know the lesbian when we see or read her?

We will begin our foray into these issues via contemporary cultural theories of sexuality and lesbianism, including the work of Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, and those literary scholars who employ their methods. We will then survey the more empirical field of lesbian history, including the work of such scholars as Bernadette Brooten, Lillian Faderman, Carroll Smith-Rosenberg, Martha Vicinus, and Patricia Crawford. Because the professor’s main area of scholarship is the literature and culture of early modern England, we will then turn, as a sort of case-study, to representations of female-female intimacy and eroticism in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England. We will look at trial records and court gossip as well as male- and female-authored poetry, stageplays, and medical books, focusing particularly on the figures of the “chaste female friend” and the “tribade.” We will ask whether representations of lesbianism changed over the course of the seventeenth century, and if so, in relation to what other cultural forces (e.g., domesticity, nationalism, emerging discourses of race). Depending on the research interests of seminar participants, the final segment of the semester could be devoted to the issues, texts, and research topics drawn from other pre- or early modern periods and cultures.