GOVT 4625 - [Sexuality and the Law]

(crosslisted) AMST 4625, FGSS 4610
(KCM-AS)

Spring. Next offered 2016-2017. 4 credits.

Co-meets with AMST 6625/FGSS 7620/GOVT 7625.

A. M. Smith.

An advanced feminist theory/political theory/ queer theory/legal theory seminar for graduate students and law students. The seminar will deal first with theoretical approaches to sexuality that build on and interrogate the post-structuralist approach that defines sexuality as a social construction, rather than an expression of a-historical instincts. Then we will explore a series of major legal and political issues: the right to privacy with respect to contraception and abortion; the restriction of abortion rights; the exclusion of homosexual sodomy from the practices protected by the right to privacy; the racial regulation of marriage; same-sex marriage; Fineman’s “sexual family” critique of family law; the moral regulation of poor women in early welfare law; the sexual regulation of poor single mothers in contemporary welfare law; the question of suspect class status for lesbians and gay men; and homosexuality and military service. Throughout the course, we will examine the extent to which sexuality is constructed in articulation with gender, class and race differences. Our reading list will include theoretical works (Foucault, Butler, Cohen and Martin), Supreme Court decisions; and critical commentaries by feminist legal theorists. (PT)