UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO, SCARBOROUGH
GGR D10, HEALTH AND SEXUALITY
FALL 2007
Tuesday 11-1, MW 264
Course Syllabus
Professor Mark Hunter
Room: B527
E-mail: mhunter@utsc.utoronto.ca
Office hours: Thursday 10-11 & 1-2 or by appointment.
COURSE DESCRIPTION
This course explores changing configurations of love, money, and sex in today’s
increasingly integrated but unequal global world. It examines the implications of these
changes for health, especially sexual health. The course gives particular attention to the
political economy of intimacy; specifically, the ways in which intimate relationships
encompassing sex and love are moulded by social inequalities.
Throughout the course we adopt a critical perspective towards public health. We explore
the often Western-centric tropes through which public health interventions—for instance
on AIDS--can operate. Just as public health sometimes exoticizes its subjects we
exoticize public health, interrogating the way that it approaches sexuality and disease. We
also explore activist approaches to health and sexuality, including AIDS groups in the US
and South Africa.
Questions we will address will include the following:
-- How has sexuality/intimacy changed over the last several decades?
-- How do public health institutions approach health and sexuality?
-- How do ideas of manhood shape health outcomes?
-- What is the relationship between gender and sex exchanges?
-- How has treatment activism affected health and sexuality?
COURSE OBJECTIVES
By the end of the course you should have an understanding of the following:


Theoretical debates surrounding transformations in intimacy
Assumptions that are often prevalent in public health relating to sexuality
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

The ways in which global inequalities shape health and sexuality
The ways in which sexuality and health can become politicized
COURSE PLAN AND GRADING
Grade Breakdown
Class Participation
Class Presentation
Paper Proposal (6 Nov)
Annotated Bibliography (6 Nov)
Short ‘Review’ (20 Nov)
Term paper (12-15 pages double spaced) (27 Nov)
15%
15%
10%
10%
10%
40%
This is an advanced seminar and not a lecture course; students are expected to come
prepared having read the texts. Class participation is a requirement and worth 15%.
Students will be asked to present the topic for about 15-20 minutes at the start of one
seminar; this will also account for 15% of the grade. The presentation should introduce
the topic but also go beyond simply summarizing. This can be through thoughtful
discussion, the posing of questions, the linking of the readings to other readings we have
looked at or to current events. You are not required to use Powerpoint but it may help
help to organize your presentation. I will E-mail students after each presentation with
some brief comments and an approximate grade.
The end of term paper will constitute 40% of the final grade. Detailed information about
the format of the paper are given below. The paper should be handed in during class on
27 Nov. A late assignment will lose 20% if handed in one day late, 40% if handed in two
days late, and it will not be graded after that.
You must also prepare a well-crafted but succinct proposal of 2 pages (double spaced)
that will account for 10% of your mark and a one to two paged annotated bibliography
that will account for another 10%. In the annotated bibliography (single spaced) you must
state the readings you intend to use and a one or two sentences on how they are relevant
to your paper. These two assignments must be handed in on 6 Nov in class. The same late
penalties apply for this as for the main paper.
The short review is a three paged double spaced piece that can be handed in at any class
but no later than 20 Nov. This can be a review of a public lecture you have attended, or a
film, TV programme, or news item you have seen. You must discuss the chosen item
with relation to some of the themes in the class.
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READINGS
All of the readings will be available through the intranet. Required readings must be read
before the class. Optional readings are available for most weeks and will assist in the
writing of papers.
ESSAY GUIDELINES
ESSENTIALS
•
You must use (i.e. quote from or reference) AT LEAST 7 articles/book chapters
from the course.
•
The paper should use 12 point font and be 12-15 pages long (including references
but these must be kept to less than 2 pages and can be single spaced)
•
Margins should be 1” at the top and bottom of the page and 1.25” on the sides.
•
You may use footnotes but please use less than 10 and try to keep them below 5
(2 or 3 is normal for this sized paper).
•
Please use either Chicago style (author-date) referencing system (set out in
http://www.libs.uga.edu/ref/chicago.html) or APA style (set out in
http://www.liu.edu/cwis/CWP/library/workshop/citapa.htm).
•
Late papers WILL be penalized.
HINTS. What makes a great essay?
--It is well written (good simple jargon free language etc.)
--It has a logical structure (the argument or points being made flow in a way that makes
sense).
--It has good references (accurate use of Chicago or APA style).
--It is succinct (i.e. makes points clearly and accurately rather than through long winded
statements. The first draft of every paper should be around 50% over the word limit.
Then it should be edited down. It is amazing how good editing allows you to say more
with less).
--It shows analytical skills.
--It shows an element of innovation.
THE BIGGEST TIP IS --- START EARLY
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DETAILED COURSE OUTLINE
Class 1 (11 Sept): Introduction
Class 2 (18 Sept): Key Concepts
Required
Ehrenreich, Barbara & Hochschild, Arlie. 2003. Global Woman. Nannies, Maids, and Sex
Workers in the New Economy. New York: Henry Holt. “Introduction,” 1-13.
Farmer, Paul. 2004. “An Anthropology of Structural Violence,” and “Comments and
Reply,” Current Anthropology, 45, 3: 304-324.
Seidman, Steven. 1991. Romantic Longings: Love in America, 1830-1980. New York:
Routledge. “Introduction,” 1-9.
Optional
Schoepf, BG, Schoepf, C, Millen, JV. 2000. Theoretical Therapies, Remote Remedies:
SAPs and the Political Ecology of Poverty and Health in Africa. In Kim, JY, Millen, JV,
Gershman, J, Irwin, A (eds.). Dying for Growth: Global Inequality and the Health of the
Poor. Monroe, ME: Common Courage Press. (note this is also about AIDS in Africa)
Week 3 (25 Sept): Exoticizing Public Health (1). Introducing Sex, Health and
Development
Required
Adams, Vincanne & Pigg, Stacy. 2005. Sex in Development: Science, sexuality, and
Morality in Global Perspective. Durham: Duke University Press. “Introduction,” 1- 38.
Parker, R. 2001. Sexuality, culture, and power in HIV/AIDS Research. Annual Review of
Anthropology 30:163-79.
Optional
Treichler, P. 1999. Aids, Africa, and Cultural Theory”. In Treichler, P. A. (1999). How to
have theory in an epidemic : Cultural chronicles of AIDS. Durham: Duke University
Press.
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Week 4 (2 Oct): Exoticizing Public Health (2): Ethics and epidemiology
Required
Cradock, S. 2004. “Aids and Ethics: Clinical trials, Pharmaceuticals, and Global Scientific
Practice.” In Kalipeni, E. et. Al. HIV & Aids in Africa: Beyond Epidemiology. Oxford.
Blackwell.
Farmer, Paul. 2005. Pathologies of Power. Health, human rights, and the new war on the
poor. Berkeley: University of California Press. “Introduction,” 1-22.
Schoepf, Brooke. 2004. “Aids, History, and Struggles over Meaning.” In Kalipeni, E. et.
Al. HIV & Aids in Africa: Beyond Epidemiology. Oxford. Blackwell.
Optional
Arnfred, S. 2005. “Introduction.” In Arnfred, S. (2004). Re-thinking sexualities in Africa.
Uppsala: Nordiska Afrikainstitutet.
Week 5 (9 Oct): Race, Colonialism and Health
Required
Mcclintock, Anne. 1995. Imperial Leather: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in the Colonial
Conquest. New York ; London: Routledge. Chpt. 1 “The Lay of the Land,” 21-74.
Vaughan, Megan. 1991. Curing Their ills. Colonial Power and African Illness. Stanford:
Stanford University Press. “Syphilis and Sexuality: The Limits of Colonial Medical
Power,” 129-154.
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Week 6 (16 Oct): AIDS ‘denialism” and Activism
Movie clip from State of Denial.
Required
Fassin, Didier. 2007. When Bodies Remember. Experiences and Politics of AIDS in South
Africa. Berkeley: University of California Press. Selected pages.
Nattrass, Nicoli. 2007. Mortal Combat: AIDS Denialism and the Struggle
for Antiretrovirals in South Africa. Pietermaritzburg: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press.
Selected pages.
Suresh Roberts, Ronald. 2007. Fit to Govern: The Native Intelligence of Thabo Mbeki.
STE Publishers. Selected Pages.
Optional
Mbali, M. 2004. Government Denialism and Post-apartheid Aids Policy Making.
Transformation, (54), 104-122.
Robins, S. 2004. 'Long live Zackie, long live': Aids Activism, Science and Citizenship
after Apartheid. Journal of Southern African Studies, 30(3), 651-672.
Sember, Robert & Gere, David. 2006. “Let the Record Show . . .": Art Activism and the
AIDS Epidemic. American Journal of Public Health; 96, 6: 967-9.
Week 7 (23 Oct): Sex, Exchange and Health
Required
Hunter, Mark. 2007. “The Changing Political Economy of Sex in South Africa: the
Significance of Unemployment and Inequalities to the Scale of the Aids pandemic.”
Social Science & Medicine 64 (2007): 689-700.
Rebhun, Linda-Anne. 1999. The Heart is Unknown Country: Love in the Changing
Economy of Northeast Brazil. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Chpt 3. “Love as
Connection. Social Network and Emotion in an Ambiguous Economy,” 57-86.
Satz, Debra. 1995. “Markets in Women’s Sexual Labour.” Ethics 106, no. 1: 63-85.
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Optional
Bailey, Beth. 1988. From Front Porch to Back Seat. Courtship in Twentieth-Century
America. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. “Introduction,” 1-12.
Wardlow, Holly. 2006. Wayward Women : Sexuality and Agency in a New Guinea
Society. Berkeley, Calif.; London: University of California Press. Chapter 5. “’Eating her
own vagina’ Passenger Women and Sexuality,” 166-190.
Week 8 (30 Oct): Transnational Relations and Sexuality
Required
Brennan, Denise. 2004. What’s Love got to do with it? Transnational Desires and Sex
Tourism in the Dominican Republic. Durham: Duke University Press. Chpt 3.
“Performing love,” 91-115.
Constable, Nicole. 2003. Romance on a Global Stage. Berkeley: University of California
Press. “Fairy Tales, Family Values,” 91-115.
Enloe, Cynthia. 1993. The Morning After. Sexual Politics and the end of the Cold War.
Berkeley: University of California Press. “It takes more than two,” 142-160.
Optional
Altman, Dennis. 2001. Global Sex. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. “Introduction,”
1-9.
Week 9 (6 Nov): Decentring heterormative sexualities
Required
Browne, Kath. 2006. Challenging Queer Geographies. Antipode. 885-893.
Ilan H. Meyer, “Why Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Public Health?” American
Journal of Public Health, June 2001, vol.91, No.6, pp.856-859.
Thorpe, Jocelyn. 2005. Redrawing National Boundaries: Gender, Race, Class and samesex marriage Discourse in Canada. Canadian Women Studies, Winter/Spring. 15-21.
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Optional
Donham, D. 1998. Feeing south africa: The "modernization" of male-male sexuality in
soweto. Cultural Anthropology, 13(1), 3-21.
Week 10 (13 Nov): Blind alleys in AIDS research through sex?
Required
Packard, R., & Epstein, P. 1991. Epidemiologists, Social scientists, and the Structure of
Medical Research on AIDS in Africa. Social Science and Medicine, 33(7), 771-794.
Stillwaggon, Eileen. Perspective. 2006. In Aids and The Ecology of Poverty. Oxford:
Oxford University Press. “Perspective,” 3-27.
Week 11 (20 Nov): Masculinities and Health
Required
Connell, R. 2001. The Men and the Boys. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Chapter 3 “Masculinities and Globalization,” 39-66.
Emslie, Carol; Ridge, Damien, Ziebland, Sue; Hunt, Kate. 2006. Men’s Accounts of
Depression: Reconstructing or Resisting Hegemonic Masculinities? Social Science and
Medicine. 69, 2: 2246-2257.
Optional
Hunter, Mark. 2005. “Cultural Politics and Masculinities.” Culture, Health and Sexuality
7, no. 4: 389-403.
Week 12 (27 Nov): Class Review
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