WRITING THE BODY
Summer 2016
Prof. Carol Sternhell
20 Cooper Square, Room 730
Phone: 212-998-7999
E-mail: cs5@nyu.edu
To what extent are we our bodies? Do we inhabit them, flee them, celebrate them, transcend them? How do others “read” our bodies? Are we accepted by our culture … admired … despised? Writing the Body is a course for everyone with a body—a female body, a male body, or a body of uncertain gender. We will read a wide variety of individual body-­‐centered accounts (What is it like to be quadriplegic and only be able to move your mouth? What is it like to be very fat?) and cultural analyses (If egg and sperm both move to meet in the Fallopian tube, who decided to call the sperm active and the egg passive? Is plastic surgery barbaric or empowering?). Topics discussed will include—but not be limited to—beauty, weight, sex, rape, menstruation, abortion, penis size, transgender identity, body modification (tattoos, piercing, and beyond), disability, and race. Student participation in this seminar is key: students are expected to attend all sessions, to complete all the reading, to participate actively in discussion, and to lead one of the class sessions themselves. Leading a class means opening the day’s conversation with a presentation, critiquing and elaborating on the assigned reading, bringing in additional relevant material, and suggesting questions or issues that seem particularly interesting or troublesome. In addition to extensive reading and discussion, students will write several versions of their own stories of embodiment. READINGS All readings will be handed out in class or available on NYU Classes. They will include articles, essays, poetry, and blogs, as well as selections from the following books (among others): Abortion & Life, Jennifer BaumgartnerFeminist Theory and the Body: A Reader, edited by Janet Price and MargritShildrick Aching for Beauty: Footbinding in China, Wang Ping Adam’s Rib, Ruth Herschberger The Beauty Myth, Naomi Wolf Beauty Secrets, Wendy Chapkis Black Looks: Race and Representation, bell hooks Bodies of Subversion: A Secret History of Women and Tattoo, Margot Mifflin Body as Evidence: Mediating Race, Globalizing Gender, Janell Hobson Delusions of Gender, Cordelia Fine Face Value: The Politics of Beauty, Robin Lakoff and Raquel Scherr Gender Outlaws: The Next Generation, Kate Bornstein and S. Bear Bergman Hair Story: Untangling the Roots of Black Hair in America, Ayana Byrd and Lori Tharps In the Flesh: The Cultural Politics of Body Modification, Victoria Pitts The Male Body, Susan Bordo Manhood in America: A Cultural History, Michael Kimmel The Obsession: Reflections on the Tyranny of Slenderness, Kim Chernin Pleasure and Danger: Toward a Politics of Sexuality, Carole Vance Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty, Nancy Etcoff Ways of Seeing, John Berger With the Power of Each Breath: A Disabled Women’s Anthology, edited by Susan E. Browne, Debra Connors, and Nanci Stern The Woman in the Body: A Cultural Analysis of Reproduction, Emily Martin SYLLABUS Week 1: Beauty Day 1 Introduction to the course. In-­‐class writing assignment. Day 2 Beauty. Read: Naomi Wolf, from The Beauty Myth; Kasey Edwards, “The Best Ice-­‐
breakers for Girls”; Seth Stephens-­‐Davidowitz, “Google, Tell Me, Is My Son a Genius?”; Robin Lakoff and Raquel Scherr, “Men and Beauty” from Face Value (all in Beauty folder on NYU Classes); and John Berger, from Ways of Seeing (in Ways of Seeing folder). Week 2: Bodies Day 3 Fat and Thin/Hair and Skin. Read: Kim Chernin, from The Obsession; Naomi Wolf, “Hunger,” from The Beauty Myth; Carol Munter, “Fat and the Fantasy of Perfection”; Nathaniel Penn, “20% of Anorexics are Men,” Louis Peitzman, “It Gets Better Unless You’re Fat,” and Katy Waldman and Mark Joseph Stern, “A Straight Woman and a Gay Man Talk Body Image” (all in Fat and Thin folder); and Wendy Chapkis, from Beauty Secrets; Nancy Etcoff, from Survival of the Prettiest; Melissa Harris-­‐Perry, “I Remember Every Hairdo I’ve Had in 40 Years”; Emily Gibson, “The War on Pubic Hair Must End,” and Victoria Clayton, “Is Hairless More?” (all in Hair and Skin folder). Day 4 Private parts. Read: Nora Ephron, “A Few Words About Breasts”; Susan Bordo, “Hard and Soft” from The Male Body; Buck Angel, “The Power of My Vagina”; Hattie Gossett, “Is It True What They Say About Colored Pussy?”, and Sharon Olds, “Outside the Operating Room of the Sex-­‐Change Doctor” (all in Private Parts folder). Also please watch the following weird documentaries: http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/my-­‐
penis-­‐and-­‐everyone-­‐elses/ and http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/perfect-­‐vagina/. Essay 1 due. Sharing of student work. Week 3: Biology Day 5 Sex and Gender/Sperm and Egg. Read: Cordelia Fine, “Delusions of Gender” and “Neurosexism,” both from Delusions of Gender; Judith Lorber, “Believing Is Seeing”; and Karin Martin, “Becoming a Gendered Body” (all in Delusions of Gender folder); and Ruth Herschberger, “Society Writes Biology” from Adam’s Rib, and Emily Martin, “Menstruation and Menopause” from The Woman in the Body (both in Society Writes Biology folder). Sharing of student work. Day 6 Birth and abortion. Read: Jennifer Baumgardner, from Abortion & Life, and Sallie Tisdale, “We Do Abortions Here” (both in Society Writes Biology folder), and Katha Pollitt, “Who Has Abortions?” (in Transgressions folder). Week 4: Sex Day 7 Pleasure. Read: Lisa Jervis and Andi Zeisler, from Bitchfest; Hanna Rosin, “Boys on the Side”; Alice Dreger, “What If We Admitted to Children that Sex Is Primarily About Pleasure?”; Audre Lorde, “Erotic as Power”; Dina Rickman, “Feminist Porn”; Jenny Block, “The Most Important Thing Teen Girls Should Do but Don’t”; Tracy Clark-­‐Flory, “Ready Set Masturbate!”; Kim Kaletsky, “Asexual and Happy”; and Sharon Olds, “Bestiary” (all in Sex, Desire and Danger folder). Essay 2 due. Sharing of student work. Day 8 Danger. Read: Soraya Chemaly, “50 Actual Facts About Rape,” Andra Medea and Kathleen Thompson, from Against Rape; Donna Freitas, “Time to Stop Hooking Up”; Emily Yoffe, “College Women: Stop Getting Drunk”; Katie McDonough, “Sorry, Emily Yoffe, Blaming Assault on Women’s Drinking Is Wrong, Dangerous, and Tired”; Charles Clymer, “Emily Yoffe Joins ‘Don’t Drink and Vagina’ Campaign”; Randall Patterson, “Students of Virginity”; Walt Bogdanich, “How One College Handled a Sexual Assault Complaint,”; Michael Winerip, “Stepping Up to Stop Sexual Assault”; and Michael Kimmel, “Ban Frat Parties” (all in Sex, Desire and Danger folder). Sharing of student work. Week 5: Differences Day 9 What is “race”? Read: bell hooks, from Black Looks; Peggy McIntosh, “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”; Wendy Chapkis, “Skin Deep” from Beauty Secrets; Susan Saulny, “Black? White? Asian? More Young Americans Choose All of the Above”; Tanzina Vega, “Colorblind Notions Aside, Colleges Grapple with Racial Tension”; Jelani Cobb, “Black Like Her”; and Tamara Winfrey Harris, “Black Like Who?” (all in Race and Ethnicity folder). Day 10 Disabilities. Read: Read: Wendy Chapkis, from Beauty Secrets; Susan Browne, Debra Connors, and Nanci Stern, from With the Power of Each Breath; Andrew Solomon, “Defiantly Deaf”; Joan McFadden, “I Have a Great Sex Life”; Julia Bascom, “Just Stimming”; Marsha Saxton, “Sticks and Stones”; and Ron Suskind, “Reaching My Autistic Son through Disney” (all in Abilities/Disabilities? folder). Week 6: Transgressions/Transformations Day 11 Gender outlaws. Read: Kay Siebler, “Transgender Transitions”; Kate Bornstein and S. Bear Bergman, from Gender Outlaws; Hanna Rosin, “A Boy’s Life”; Kate Rood, “The Sea Horse, Our Family Mascot”; Diane Daniel, “My Husband Is Now My Wife”; Elliott DeLine, “Stuck at the Border between the Sexes”; Katha Pollitt, “Who Has Abortions?”; Elinor Burkett, “What Makes a Woman?”; Zeba Blay, “Why Comparing Rachel Dolezal To Caitlyn Jenner Is Detrimental To Both Trans and Racial Progress”; and Vanessa Vitiello Urquhart, “It Isn’t Crazy to Compare Rachel Dolezal with Caitlyn Jenner” (all in Transgressions folder). Essay 3 due. Day 12 Body modification. Read: Margot Mifflin, from Bodies of Subversion; Victoria Pitts, from In the Flesh; Amanda Hess, “When Will ‘Aesthetic Plastic Surgery’ Empower Men Too?”; Libby Copeland, “Are Breast Implants and Genital Mutilation the Same Thing?”; Melanie Berliet, “Plastic Surgery Confidential”; and Zara Stone, “The K-­‐Pop Plastic Surgery Obsession” (all in Transgressions folder). Sharing of student work. Celebration!