Professor Deborah Elliston
Department of Anthropology
Office phone: 607/777-2722
Science Building I, Room #114A
Binghamton University/SUNY

COURSE DESCRIPTION
In this course we explore sexualities from anthropological perspectives, raising questions about the histories, meanings, and uses of sexuality in Euro-American and "non-Western" societies, and about the place of sexuality in relationships between "the West" and "the non-West" (via colonialism, imperialism, globalization). As that suggests, the course's organization reflects an approach to defining and studying sexualities that is both expansive and integrative. This approach enables us to consider, in different societies and at different historical moments, the interrelationships between sexuality and, for example, understandings of the body, the person, community, reproduction, knowledge, hierarchy, desire, and power, as well as politics, economics, kinship, and religion, among others. Such an approach also licenses us to examine the links between sexuality and the development and maintenance of race/racisms, class, and gender hierarchies and ideologies. As part of this approach, we will study indigenous theories of sexuality in several societies, including the U.S., by reading ethnographic case studies which take sexuality as a key focus. The case studies you will encounter in our readings range from 17th century Western Europe to 19th century colonial Southeast Asia to early 20th century Pacific Islander societies; they treat privileged white teens in Atlanta, Georgia, and working-class transgender prostitutes in Salvador, Brazil. The topics they investigate range from queer sexualities to "family values"; from HIV/AIDS to penis size; from scientific discourse on sexuality to sex workers' narratives on their labors; from representations of sexuality and race in National Geographic to the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling decriminalizing sodomy.

The general projects of this course are three: (1) by studying the variability in what sexuality is and can be, to learn to pose critical questions about how sexuality comes to mean in relation to other features of social life (politics, economics, kinship, gender, stratification/hierarchy, etc.); (2) to learn to analyze the assumptions - cultural, political, theoretical- embedded in or informing sexual practice, sexual desire, and discourses on sexuality; and (3) to develop understandings of human sexualities that are less wedded to and more critically aware of the cultural assumptions of U.S. American society.

COURSE PREREQUISITES & FORMAT
This course fulfills Category "G" (Global Interdependencies) of Binghamton University's General Education program. The core projects of the course which relate to "Global Interdependencies" include: exploring sex and sexuality as distinctive historical features and foundational aspects of "Western" social organization and investigating the unfolding of that history; exploring sex and sexuality in their varied formulations as distinctive features of "non-Western" societies; and exploring the siting and uses of sexuality in the power-laden relationships between "the West" and "the non-West."

The class format will consist of lecture and discussion, including regular small-group in-class discussions and various in-class exercises designed to enhance and deepen your engagements with course projects and materials.

COURSE READINGS
Four books and one pamphlet (Holland et al.) have been ordered as required reading for this course and will be available for purchase at the University bookstore. One copy (in some cases, two copies) of each of these works is also available on 2-hour reserve at the Bartle Library reserve reading room.

Foucault, Michel. 1990. The History of Sexuality, Volume 1: An Introduction. New York: Vintage Books.

Holland, Janet, Caroline Ramazanoglu, Sue Sharpe, and Rachel Thomson. 1992. Pressured Pleasure: Young Women and the Negotiation of Sexual Boundaries. Wrap Paper 7. London: The Tufnell Press.

Kulick, Don. 1998. Travesti: Sex, Gender, and Culture among Brazilian Transgendered Prostitutes. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

LaFont, Suzanne, ed. 2003. Constructing Sexualities: Readings in Sexuality, Gender, and Culture. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Lancaster, Roger N. and Micaela di Leonardo, eds. 1997. The Gender/Sexuality Reader: Culture, History, Political Economy. New York: Routledge.

In addition to the books (and pamphlet) listed above, other required readings consist of articles and chapters from books which are not found in any of the course books, and these have all been placed on Bartle Library's new Electronic Reserves service (access at http://eres.binghamton.edu). Electronic reserves are available to registered students as full-text files that may be downloaded and printed (from any campus computer or home) using ERes software. You will need a password to access on-line ERes readings, which I will give out at the beginning of the semester.

Copies of readings that have been placed on Electronic Reserve are not available in xerox (print) form. However, for readings excerpted from books, most (but not all) of the books themselves have also been placed on regular 2-hour reserve at Bartle Library. (To find an excerpted book chapter in book form, note that you will oftentimes need to search under the name of the editor of the book in which the chapter was published, rather than under the name of the chapter's author.) A full listing of course readings on Electronic and Regular Reserve is provided at the end of this syllabus.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS & ASSESSMENT
Clear understanding of and thoughtful engagement with course readings and course projects necessitate coming to class and doing the assigned reading by the date it is due (as laid out in the Class Schedule). To encourage each of you to develop such clear understandings and thoughtful engagements, and to allow each of you opportunities to demonstrate your competencies, the following will be required and determine your final grade:

(1) Attendance. Attendance is mandatory and will be taken at each class meeting. You are allowed up to three absences over the semester. If you miss more than three classes, your final grade will be reduced by 1/3 of a letter grade for each two absences over the three allowed absences. (If, for example, your final grade worked out to an A, and you had a total of five absences, your final grade would be reduced by 1/3 of a letter grade for the extra two absences, and become an A-. If under the same circumstances you had four total absences and your final grade hovered at A/A-, the extra absence would determine an A-.) The only exception to the three-absence limit is absence due to documented personal or medical emergencies (you are responsible for providing appropriate documentation).

(2) Pop Quizzes. (25% of final grade). You can expect about eight pop quizzes over the course of the semester. These short in-class quizzes will test whether you completed and understood the readings assigned for that class (as given on the Class Schedule) and, in some cases, the preceding class or two.

(3) Short Assignments. (25% of final grade) There will be six to eight "short assignments" over the course of the semester, and they will have variable point values announced at the time each is assigned. Most of these will be mini-research assignments; some will be mini-analysis assignments. For a mini-analysis assignment I might ask you, for example, to reflect on and write a brief (1-2 page) response to a question related to recent readings, lectures, or in-class discussions. For a mini-research assignment, for example, I might ask you to do some web-based research on a specific topic and give me a write-up of your findings (1-2 pages).

(4) Midterm Exam. (25% of final grade) The Midterm will take the form of a take-home exam responsive to questions I will hand out about a week in advance of the Exam's due date. The questions will be developed out of the first half of the course readings, lectures, and in-class discussions, and you will be asked to write essays responsive to the questions. The Midterm will be graded on the basis of depth of understanding demonstrated in your essays, clarity of thought demonstrated, and clarity of writing.

(5) Final Exam. (25% of final grade) Our Final Exam will take place during Final Exams Week. The Final will consist of short answer and short essay questions and it will be cumulative, i.e., it will cover the entire semester's readings, films, lectures, class discussions, etc..

MISCELLANEOUS COURSE POLICIES
(1) Lateness. All written work required for this course will have specific due dates. Failure to submit such work by the date it is due will result in a late penalty. The late penalty will be calculated by a progressive reduction in the grade based on the number of class meetings between the class when the assignment was due and the class when you ultimately submit it: your grade for the late assignment will be reduced by 1/3 of a letter grade for each class meeting the lateness drags on. (If, for example, you submit homework meriting a B+ on a Thursday that was due earlier in the week on Tuesday, your grade would be reduced by 1/3 of a letter grade, to B; if you submit that same homework on the following Tuesday, one week late, your grade would be reduced by a 2/3 of a letter grade, to B-.) That said, the very last day I will accept late written work is our last regular class meeting (12/11).

(2) Academic Dishonesty. I expect each of you to practice academic honesty in this class. That means each of you is individually responsible for completing all assignments yourself (readings, writings, quizzes, exams) and that only such independent accomplishment will serve as the basis of your grade. While I will encourage you to discuss ideas with one another (and with me and the teaching assistants), each of you is independently accountable for undertaking the labor involved in completing all course assignments. Thus, in this course you must submit your own written work only; take quizzes and exams by relying solely on the knowledge and understandings you have acquired; use quotation marks around each statement you take from a published source (and provide the reference for the published work); give references for all published works on which you have drawn in any substantive way (not only by directly quoting) for your written assignments (authors, texts, websites), etc..

Any incident of academic dishonesty (copying from a classmate on a quiz; using notes for a quiz; submitting a paper or other written assignment that you purchased, begged off a friend or otherwise did not write yourself; submitting a mini-research assignment that basically copies its findings from a website, etc.; see the University Bulletin for additional examples ) will result, minimally, in an automatic "F" for the assignment. Such academic dishonesty may also result in an "F" for the course and could result in letters of reprimand, probation, suspension or expulsion from the University.

I encourage you to read in full the Bulletin section that clarifies the Student Academic Honesty and Integrity Code (available at http://bulletin.binghamton.edu). The Bulletin provides definitions of various kinds of academic dishonesty, including cheating on examinations, multiple submissions, unauthorized collaboration, fabrication and misrepresentation, forgery, sabotage, and bribery, as well as plagiarism. Reading these definitions should aid you in identifying and thereby avoiding academic dishonesty. The Bulletin's definition of plagiarism, for example, offers the following clarifications:
Plagiarism is presenting the work of another person as one's own work (including papers, words, ideas, information, computer code, data, evidence-organizing principles, or style of presentation of someone else taken from the Internet, books, periodicals or other sources). Plagiarism includes: quoting, paraphrasing or summarizing without acknowledgment even a few phrases; failing to acknowledge the source of either a major idea or ordering principle central to one's own paper; relying on another person's data, evidence or critical method without credit or permission; submitting another person's work as one's own; using unacknowledged research sources gathered by someone else.
(http://bulletin.binghamton.edu/introdisplay2003.asp?program_id=197#15, accessed 8/25/2003)

Binghamton University has joined an on-line plagiarism and prevention detection service, "Turnitin.com". By registering for this course, you agree that any written work you submit may be subjected to a textual similarity review by Turnitin.com.

(3) Appropriate Use of E-mail. Written work for this course will not be accepted via e-mail.

ADDITIONAL COURSE SUPPORTS
(1) Listserv. A class listserv will be in place by the third week of classes and all registered students will be automatically subscribed to the listserv under your Binghamton University e-mail accounts. In class I will distribute information on how to unsubscribe and resubscibe to the listserv, for those of you who rarely use your University accounts and prefer to subscribe using an alternative e-mail address. I strongly encourage you to use the listserv to continue conversations or debates that began in class, to discuss readings, films, lectures, relevant current events or campus events, etc. - in short, to discuss anything that relates in some way to our course projects or materials. You may, of course, also use the listserv for more pragmatic concerns such as questions about finding a reading, setting up study or discussion groups, etc.. The listserv is for you to use as a resource for and adjunct to our course.

(2) A Dynamic Classroom. There will probably be times when lectures or in-class discussions are not working to help you to clearly understand course materials - readings, assignments, etc.. In large classes like this one, a key challenge faculty face is to present materials in ways that are illuminating for each and every one of the students in the lecture hall. For that reason and many others, please raise the questions you have about course materials during our class meetings. In most cases, the question you're thinking of raising is one that some of your classmates are also mulling over. Asking questions also makes for a much more interesting classroom: it keeps you engaged, it's interesting (and more fun) for me, and it's an important aid to my ability to help you understand course materials.

(3) Meeting with the Teaching Staff. That said, there may well be times when the answers you get to questions you ask in class still do not help you to clearly understand course materials. If you are having difficulties with course readings or assignments, I strongly encourage you to meet with me or with one of the teaching assistants to discuss your questions or areas of confusion. Student/Instructor meetings can be an enormously valuable part of your learning process, and I hope you will take advantage of these opportunities. My office hours and information are given on the front page of this syllabus; the teaching assistants' office hours and information are given below. We can also set up appointments to meet with you at other times if you have scheduling conflicts with our regular office hours.

Teaching Assistants:

Negotiating "Sexual" Meanings: Contexts & Questions
Reading: Herdt, "Sambia Sexual Culture," in Constructing Sexualities, pp. 249-272.

Sexual Desire & Sexual Risk: Between Practice & Representation
Video Screening: "Frontline: Lost Children of Rockdale County." 2000. PBS. 90 min. VHS.
Reading: Hammonds (1995), "RACE, SEX, AIDS: The Construction of 'Other'," in Race, Class, and Gender: An Anthology, eds. Andersen and Hill Collins (New York: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 1995 edition), pp. 402-413 (E-RES).