UVA offers 'Black Feminist Theory' and 'Queer American History' courses this fall

The University of Virginia (UVA) students can study courses on “Black Feminist Theory” and “Queer American History” this fall.

The classes appear on the course list for the Charlottesville school’s Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality. According to its mission statement, the department is “an interdisciplinary department in which students study gender and sexualities with an emphasis on transnational perspectives.”

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The course description for “Black Feminist Theory” says that students will examine “how Black feminist thinkers interrogate specific concepts including Black womanhood, sexual mythologies and vulnerabilities, class distinctions, colorism, leadership, crime and punishment, and popular culture.”

The course particularly emphasizes “Black feminist understandings of intersectionality and womanism.”

Lanice Avery, the course instructor, performs research that promotes “healthy gender and sexual development among socially marginalized and stigmatized groups,” according to a university biography.

Queer American History will teach students about the history of LGBT activism in the United States. “Particular attention will be paid to the twentieth century, but topics covered will include the formation of heterosexual and homosexual identities and the construction of sexual practices prior to the 1900s,” a course description reads. 

Students will learn about “leftist activist movements,” such as the “Homophile Movement, Gay Liberation, and ACT UP.” 

“Although primary emphasis will be placed on historical LGBTQ activism, contemporary movements and politics regarding LGBTQ-rights will also occasionally be a focus of this course,” the description continues.

Course instructor Doug Meyer has written books called Violent Differences: The Importance of Race in Sexual Assault against Queer Men and Violence against Queer People: Race, Class, Gender, and the Persistence of Anti-LGBT Discrimination.

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Other courses taking place at UVA this fall include “Race & Power in Gender & Sexuality,” “Feminist Disability Politics,” and “Black & Indigenous Feminist Survival and Experiment.”

Many colleges and universities offer courses with similar intersectional themes. 

This spring, Cornell University offered a course focused on “Black-Queer-Feminist” identities, while Boston University taught a course called “Queering Health.”

Campus Reform has contacted the University of Virginia, Lanice Avery, and Doug Meyer for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.