LGBT - LGBTQ Studies
LGBT200 Queer Worlds: Studies in Gender and Sexuality (3 Credits)
An interdisciplinary study of the historical and social contexts of queer and trans life. Explores the social meanings of sex and gender in our current moment; traces the formation of LGBTQ+ social and cultural movements; unpacks the categorization of genders and sexualities.
Cross-listed with: WGSS201.
LGBT221 Gender in Sequence: Queering Comics (3 Credits)
Comics push the boundaries of representation in art, tempting curious readers with the hybrid possibilities that come from combining words and images. American comics have been met with restrictions due to reactionary fears about corrupting children. However, comics have a long history of challenging the status quo and forging a space for queer, women, and other marginalized communities to share their experiences through sequential art. With a focus on comics, zines, and self-published narrative images by trans, queer, and women artists, students explore the possibilities of comics as a medium of subversion and possibility. Read comics by Alison Bechdel, Bishakh Som, Lynda Barry, Julie Doucet, and others, and explore the image-texts that reshaped queer arts and literature. Students create their own comics in the tradition of boundary breaking narrative art. Prior experience in drawing is not required for success in this class.
Cross-listed with: WGSS221.
LGBT238 Topics in LGBTQ+ Studies (3 Credits)
Topics in the LGBTQ+ Studies program taught in the Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
Cross-listed with: WGSS238.
Repeatable to: 9 credits if content differs.
LGBT264 Quare/Queer Contentions: Exploration of Sexualities in the Black Community (3 Credits)
Centering the subjectivities of queer people of color generally and more specifically, Black people (as the word "quare" invites us to do), Quare/Queer Contentions takes up key moments within the history of the Black community and asks us to consider the work and presence of LGBTQ people in these moments. The course also contends with the everyday experiences of LGBTQ subjects in the Black community. Quare/Queer Contentions, therefore, interrogates the material realities of Black queer people in the context of family, religion, cultural/creative work, among others. Interdisciplinary in orientation, the course will employ primary and secondary texts, film, art, autobiographical narratives and policy data.
Cross-listed with: AAAS264, WGSS264.
Credit Only Granted for: LGBT264, AASP264, AAAS264, WMST264 or WGSS264.
LGBT265 LGBTQ+ Literatures and Media (3 Credits)
A study of literary and cultural expressions of queer and trans identities, positionalities, and analytics through an exploration of literature, art, and media. We will examine historical and political power relations by considering the intersections of sexuality and gender with race, class, nation, and disability. Topics include the social construction and regulation of sexuality and gender, performance and performativity, intersectionality, and the relationship between aesthetic forms and queer/ trans subjectivity. Our interpretations will be informed by queer and trans theories.
Cross-listed with: ENGL265.
Restriction: Must not have completed LGBT265.
LGBT288 Special Topics in LGBTQ Studies (3 Credits)
Study of particular themes and issues in LGBTQ studies.
Cross-listed with: WGSS288.
Repeatable to: 9 credits if content differs.
LGBT310 Transgender Studies (3 Credits)
Introduces students to the interdisciplinary field of transgender studies, providing a history of the field and engaging current debates within it. Students will explore the emergence and consolidation of trans identities, practices, cultures, and knowledges across medical, historical, sociological, cultural, and artistic contexts, paying particular attention to dynamics of race, class, and ability, to global and transnational difference, and to the implications of transgender studies for understanding gender and sexuality overall.
Prerequisite: LGBT200 .
Cross-listed with: WGSS310.
LGBT327 LGBTQ Film and Media (3 Credits)
Comparative analysis of forms, themes, and the politics of representation in film and video by and/or about LGBTQ people.
Cross-listed with: ENGL359F, WGSS327.
Restriction: Junior standing or higher.
LGBT338 Topics in LGBTQ Studies (3 Credits)
Topics course in LGBTQ Studies
Cross-listed with: WGSS338.
Repeatable to: 9 credits if content differs.
LGBT350 LGBTQ+ Public Speaking and Facilitation (3 Credits)
Guides students through oral communication skills around LGBTQ+ topics. The course centers the experiences of minoritized intersectional LGBTQ+ communities, and students will use speaking, presentation, and facilitation skills to educate the UMD community about sexual orientation and gender identity and expression through panel discussions in classes, residence halls, and other university settings. Students who have received training for this purpose enter into these discussions prepared to disseminate accurate information, to answer questions that students, staff, and faculty may have about the realities of LGBTQ+ lives. Students will receive training that is rooted in queer theory and social justice education, building on the prerequisite course LGBT 200.
Prerequisite: LGBT200.
Restriction: Must have permission of LGBT Studies Program.
LGBT359 Special Topics in LGBTQ+ Literatures and Media (3 Credits)
Selected study of a topic pertinent to literary and cultural expressions of LGBTQ+ identities, positionalities, and analytics through an exploration of literature, art, and/or media.
Cross-listed with: ENGL359.
Repeatable to: 9 credits if content differs.
LGBT386 Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Community Organization Internship (3-6 Credits)
Supervised internship experience with a community organization that expressly serves lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people. Students will be expected to relate course material to experience in an analysis of an organization's activities.
Prerequisite: 9 credits in LGBT courses.
Restriction: Permission of LGBT Studies Program.
LGBT398 Special Topics in LGBTQ Studies (3 Credits)
In-depth study of particular themes and issues in LGBTQ studies.
Prerequisite: LGBT200.
Restriction: Sophomore standing or higher.
Repeatable to: 9 credits if content differs.
LGBT411 Black Queer Studies (3 Credits)
Black Queer Studies is an intersectional and interdisciplinary approach to LGBTQ+ Studies and Black Studies. In this course, we will center Blackness to meditate upon the overlapping and interwoven categories of race, gender, and sexuality with the goal of decoupling whiteness from LGBTQ+ studies and decoupling heterosexuality from Black studies. We will look at texts from the humanities and social sciences as well literature and film in order to trace topical trajectories of Black queer thought. We will explore the meaning of queerness in relation to blackness, touch upon moments in black queer history, analyze questions of black queer representation and erasure, and press upon "hot button" topics such as queer identity and the black church, African and global queer and trans identities, Blackness and homophobia, white LGBTQ+ racism, and Black queer pleasure. Throughout we will consider how Black queer liberation can and has provided tools and a guide for our collective liberation.
Cross-listed with: AAAS416, WGSS411.
Credit Only Granted for: LGBT411, WGSS411, LGBT448L, or AAAS416.
Formerly: LGBT448L.
LGBT438 Advanced Topics in LGBTQ Studies (3 Credits)
Advanced Topics in LGBTQ Studies
Cross-listed with: WGSS438.
Repeatable to: 9 credits.
LGBT448 Special Topics in LGBTQ Studies (3 Credits)
In-depth study of particular themes and issues in LGBTQ studies.
Prerequisite: LGBT200; or permission of LGBT Studies Program.
Cross-listed with: WGSS449.
Restriction: Junior standing or higher.
Repeatable to: 9 credits if content differs.
LGBT448W Sex, Gender, and Jewish Identity (3 Credits)
An exploration of Jewish embodiment, including dynamics related to biological sex, culturally-framed gender, and sexuality. Topics of discussion may include transgender and intersex Jews, stereotypes and gender performance, modesty, genetics, and body alteration. Focus is on contemporary Jewish culture, framed within the larger historical and textual tradition.
Prerequisite: 1 course in WGSS; or 1 course in JWST; or 1 course in LGBT; or permission of instructor.
Cross-listed with: JWST492, WGSS492.
Credit Only Granted for: JWST492, JWST409G, LGBT448W, WMST498W or WGSS492.
Formerly: WMST498W and JWST409G.
LGBT459 Selected Topics in Sexuality and Literature (3 Credits)
Detailed study of sexuality as an aspect of literary and cultural expression.
Prerequisite: Must have completed two lower-level English courses, at least one in literature.
Repeatable to: 9 credits if content differs.
LGBT475 Magical Black Femmes: Queering Black Femininity (3 Credits)
Queer femme identity, rooted in 1940s and 1950s bar culture, continues to resonate. Often linked with butch, femme is a queer, feminine expression that challenges the binary tying femininity to cisgender, heterosexual women. Femme exists outside that frame. Black women have long moved beyond white heteropatriarchal norms, and Black femmes of all genders have turned that resistance into power. This course explores Black femme identity as a radical critique of gender, sexuality, and whiteness. Through cultural studies and humanities methods, we will examine femme's complexity and how it unsettles what we assume about queerness, femininity, and identity.
Recommended: LGBT200 or another LGBT course.
Cross-listed with: AAAS475, WGSS475.
Credit Only Granted for: LGBT475, WGSS475, AAAS475 or LGBT448E.
Formerly: LGBT448E.
LGBT488 Seminar in Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies (1-3 Credits)
Developments in theories and methods of LGBT Studies, with emphasis upon interaction between the humanities and the social sciences in the elaboration of this interdisciplinary area of scholarship.
Prerequisite: 9 credits in LGBT courses; and permission of LGBT Studies Program.
Recommended: LGBT200. And ENGL265; or CMLT291.
Repeatable to: 9 credits if content differs.
Formerly: CMLT498Y.
LGBT499 Independent Study (1-3 Credits)
Directed research and analysis in LGBT Studies on a topic selected by the student.
Prerequisite: LGBT200; and permission of LGBT Studies Program.
Restriction: Senior standing.
Repeatable to: 6 credits if content differs.