113年第1學期-2869 Sex & Sexuality: Culture and Ideas 課程資訊

評分方式

評分項目	配分比例	說明
In-class	35	Attendance, Discussion, and Participation.
Midterm	30	Create a 4-5 mins video or a picture book illustrating key ideas about sex and sexuality discussed during week 1-8. Present it during the midterm week. This can be done individually or in a group of 2-3 people.
Final	30	Create a poster (PDF) illustrating key ideas about sex and sexuality discussed during week 10-17. Present and talk about your poster during the final week. This can be done individually or in a group of 2-3 people.
Self-study (weeks 17 and 18)	5	students are to comment on the ideas of sex and sexuality introduced in the selected reading, Gavin Francis. “Gender: The Two Lives of Tiresias”. In Shapeshifters: a doctor’s notes on medicine and human change. Wellcome: 2019, pp. 143-56.

教育目標

This course explores body, gender, and sexuality in pre-modern Western and Chinese cultural discourses. We will examine representations of gender, sexuality, and sex change in the following sources: 1) Hermaphroditism (intersex) and same-sex desire from Greco-Roman medicine and mythology; 2) Queering Jesus: hermaphroditic Jesus in alchemy (煉金術); 3) The yin/yang 陰陽 androgynous body and sexual vampirism in bedchamber arts (fangzhong shu房中術); 4) Sexual anomalies, sexual relationships between female ghosts/fox spirits and men in Chinese tales of the strange (zhigui志怪). We ask how these imaginative ideas of human anatomy and cultural expression of gender and sexuality challenge our understanding of what it means to be men and women today. Critical examination of these representations suggests that sex, gender, and sexuality were largely social and cultural constructions before modern biomedical knowledge about human bodies took hold. Upon completion of this course, students will: 1. Demonstrate a fair understanding of cultural discourses on gender and sexuality. 2. Exhibit a comprehension of the interdisciplinary approaches for analyzing gender, sex, and sexuality. 3. Demonstrate adequate written and oral communication skills within various formal and informal circumstances.

基本資料

選修課，學分數：3-0
上課時間：四/2,3,4
修課班級：國際學院不分系1-4
修課年級：1年級以上
選課備註：國際學院2734課程併班上課

參考書目

Leah DeVun. “The Jesus Hermaphrodite: Science and Sex Difference in premodern Europe”. Journal of the History of Ideas 69 (2): 193-218.

Gavin Francis. “Gender: The Two Lives of Tiresias”. In Shapeshifters: a doctor’s notes on medicine and human change. Wellcome: 2019, pp. 143-56.

Veronique Mottier. “Before Sexuality”. In Sexuality: a very short introduction. Oxford University Press: 2008, pp. 3-24. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHDKk0rshtM

Gan Bao 干寶. In Search of the Supernatural搜神記: The Written Record. Translated by Kenneth DeWoskin, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996. (selected passages)

Pu Songling蒲松齡. Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio 聊齋誌異. Translated by John Minford. Penguin Books, 2006. (“The Merchant’s Son” 賈兒, pp. 133-40; “Lotus Fragrance” 蓮香, pp. 211-28)

Susan Mann. “The Body in Medicine, Art, and Sport,” in Gender and Sexuality in Modern China. Cambridge University Press: 2011, pp. 83-94.

Fuchsia Dunlop. “Dick Soup”. Lucky Peach 2014.
https://medium.com/lucky-peach/dick-soup-b3c7f5651b7a

Viagra Craze: Does Medicine Makes the Man?
Susan Bordo. “Pills and Power Tools”. In Gender Relations in Global Perspective: Essential Readings. Edited by Nancy Cook.