2022 Summer Courses

Expected Student Preparation: Familiarity with concepts and terminology from cultural studies or a related discipline (Gender & Sexuality Studies, Communications, Literature, Film, Theatre) is beneficial.

Description: Moving chronologically through the 20th century, this course will be structured around core cultural texts from different periods, communities, and moments in queer history, including novels, poetry, film, theatre, and performance. We will explore the cultural texts themselves, as well as the communities, scenes and cultures that produced, received, and formed around these texts.

The course begins with the turn of the century, examining early 20th century touchstones by artists such as Raclyffe Hall, Jennie June, and Gladys Bentley. This section will draw on scholarship such as George Chauncey’s study of gay culture from 1890-1940 and Susan Stryker’s work on early 20th century transgender history.

The course will then develop through the era between 1940 and 1969. We will study poetry and literary communities, examining the works of Audre Lorde and James Baldwin. We will also explore publications from rising advocacy groups such as the Mattachine Society and the Daughters of Bilitis.

The next section will focus on post-Stonewall queer culture (1969-1980), looking at performance acts such as the Cockettes and Sylvester, as well as drag performance. The course will then end with the period between 1980-1999, looking at cultural responses to the AIDS crisis (including AIDS theatre), New Queer Cinema, and other late 20th century cultural texts.

Avoiding a reliance on a settler-colonial notion of what constitutes “North American” history, the course will centre discussions of two-spirit identities and Indigenous art and theatre throughout the century, including readings by Qwo-Li Driskill, poetry by Billy-Ray Belcourt and performance by Waaawaate Fobister and Muriel Miguel.

Texts:

• Angels in America by Tony Kushner
• Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin
• Two-Spirit Acts edited by Jean O’Hara.

All other readings available via myCourses.

Recommended Texts: Gay New York by George Chauncey and Transgender History by Susan Stryker.

Literature will include: Audre Lorde, W.H. Auden, Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, Billy-Ray Belcourt, Cameron Awkward Rich.

Films will include: Kenneth Anger, Cheryl Dunye (The Watermelon Woman), Barbara Hammer, Jack Smith, and others.

Performances will include: Waawaate Fobister, Kent Monkman, Muriel Miguel, Tony Kushner, and the Cockettes.

Evaluation: Short paper, longer paper (or creative alternative), quizzes, public engagement project

Format: Lecture, discussion, and optional community connection component.

Description: Over the next five weeks, we will analyze the graphic novel in terms of its unique poetics—the complex interplay of word and image—and the development of the form and its subgenres. Our central focus will be on the graphic novel as a medium rather than as a genre; that is, we will attend to how formal practices of comics can be deployed to tell a broad range of stories and speak to diverse audiences. We will take a multifaceted approach to analyzing this medium, from uncovering comics’ historical roots and examining genres developed across the globe to delving into the medium’s theoretical and formal elements, as well as considerations of comics in relation to other media such as film, poetry, fiction, visual art, and even architecture. Alongside our analysis of the (often tension-filled) relationship between graphic novels and literary fiction, traditionally perceived as lowbrow and highbrow art forms respectively, we will look at how comics have become a vehicle for autobiography, journalism, social justice, and cultural critique.

While we will be learning how to close read graphic novels (i.e., how to interpret and analyze a comics page), we will also investigate how the artists create stories and characters—firstly, so that we may identify the distinctive marriage of written word and visual image available to sequential art and, secondly, so that we may become the creators of our own comics. Note: while making comics will be a meaningful component of the course, prior drawing experience is not required.

Each week we will be exploring the progression of the related themes of adolescence, gender, sex, sexuality, and transformation across several distinct examples of the form. How does the treatment of love and lust in Daniel Clowes’ Ghost World differ from that in Craig Thompson’s Blankets? Which taboo subjects do Alison Bechdel, Adrien Tomine, and Charles Burns address in their respective comics, and in what manner do their depictions differ? What do the young female protagonists in Persepolis (Satrapi), and This One Summer (Mariko and Jillian Tamaki) share in common and how do they differ? How are race, class, gender, and trauma depicted in these stories? And how are the histories of these concepts portrayed and re-imagined through the graphic novel’s unique visual and textual medium? What is told, what is shown, and what is hidden between the panels?

Texts:

All of below texts can be acquired as print books via McGill’s bookstore: Le James.

• Bechdel, Alison. Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic (Mariner, 2007). Also available as an Ebook through the publisher.
• Burns, Charles. Black Hole (Pantheon, 2008). Available in Paperback or Hardcover only.
• Clowes, Daniel. Ghost World (comic book and screening of film)
• McGuire, Richard. Here (Hamish Hamilton, 2014)
• Satrapi, Marjane. The Complete Persepolis (Pantheon, 2007) Available in Paperback or Hardcover only.
• Tamaki, Mariko, drawn by Jillian Tamaki. This One Summer (Groundwood, 2014). Available in Paperback.
• Thompson, Craig. Blankets (Top Shelf Productions, 2003)
• Tomine, Adrian. Shortcomings (Drawn and Quarterly, 2007) Available in Paperback.

Students are also encouraged to obtain used/new copies of these text by whatever means possible —directly from the publisher, through second-hand sellers, or downloaded as PDFs from select websites.

Critical secondary readings will be provided on MyCourses. Please check MyCourses regularly for announcements during the term.

Evaluation: Short analytical paper, participation, group presentation, final project or final paper.

Grade distribution:

• Attendance and Participation: (15%)
  Students are expected to have completed all readings for the day assigned and to contribute to class discussions with enthusiastic engagement.
• Short Essay #1 (25%)
  Students are expected to write an analytical essay of three to four (3–4) double-spaced pages.
  Full assignment guidelines (including suggested topics) will be available on myCourses.
• Group Presentations #2 (20%)
  Full assignment guidelines will be available on myCourses
• Final Project (40%)
  Full assignment guidelines will be available on myCourses.
• Final Project Option A: Creative Project
  Students must embark on the creation of their own graphic novel. All creative projects must be accompanied a critical statement. The critical statement must include both: (1) a critical analysis of the visual and narrative aspects of the student’s graphic novel, and (2) a critical consideration of at least two texts from the syllabus that have served as inspiration. Full assignment guidelines will be available on myCourses.
• Final Project Option B: Final Essay
  Students must submit a final paper of seven to eight (7–8) double-spaced pages in length which takes as its focus at least one of the graphic novels from our course. Students must aim to discuss the graphic novel’s literary as well as visual aspects. Full assignment guidelines (including essay topics) will be available on myCourses.