Coulmn Fodder: The Gay Class
Aug. 26th, 2003 09:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eggwardsPersonal Note:I've been sitting on this for a week. I can't seem to get it right. It's all disjointed and I can't seem to get to a clear point, but I'm putting it out here hoping for some feedback. There's something here to be said, but I'm not doing it justice right now...
For many school starts this week or the next. Millions of students return to the classroom and college students work towards their degrees, or at least the next great party. Many of those students will stick to the basic courses, following a degree plan and working to get out to and get a job.
Others will find much more. College can be a great time of discovery and awakening, away from the family and exposed to different ways of thinking. Often there are courses, and professors that challenge and enlighten.
At the University of Michigan this fall professor David Haleprin will be gearing up for another semester teaching the provocatively titled class, How To Be Gay: Male Homosexuality and Initiation.
The class explores what aspects of gay society are taught and learned as opposed to being innate. As we know, the gay community is diverse, but there are stereotypes. Camp, drag, muscle culture, style, fashion, and a love of show tunes are all attributed to being gay, but not everyone shares these traits. How do these stereotypes get created, and why do people perpetuate them? Why do gay men seem to flock to Cher, Madonna and Judy Garland?
The class allows students not only to learn about gay culture, but experience gay life through a required class project. There are also screenings of movies and shows that seem to form the backbone of gay reference points, both with gay messages, such as the Boys in The Band, and not, such as Mommie Dearest. The students will examine several gay culture references, looking at gay identity from the social practices and cultural identifications and learning how a separate culture has developed.
Folks, they are going to a gay bar.
One of the questions the class asks is how much of these references, and the images and practices of gay culture are a part of an individual's coming out and eventual identity. The class is also focused on how one not only identifies with gay culture, but also how one disassociates with the stereotype, saying "I'm gay, but I'm not like that". One might see Priscilla, Queen of The Desert and both identify with the character's plights, but never want to become a drag queen.
The question: Is there a textbook?
So here's a class that explores the gay subculture, and what it means to the identity of gays. Of course the class is tragically named. Rather than just calling the class "Gay Studies" or "Gay Culture", Prof. Haleprin wants publicity and interest in his class. Obviously, How To Be Gay is a provocative name, meant to stand out among all of the other classes. Then to add "An Initiation" further provokes those who believe it's a choice. The problem is, it attracts ire form those who choose not to understand.
Haleprin and the university are under fire by a group known as the American Family Association. As you probably already know, any group with the word "family" in it is pretty much not going to be rationally thinking about gay rights. The class has been under fire before by the same group. The group states that they don't want taxpayers money to go to such a class. This, of course is the nice, polite argument from the group.
The true fear is exposed by the Center for Reclaiming America, their website calls the class a "Homosexual Training Course." They and others were pleased when the course was cancelled a few years ago due to public pressure and lobbing of the Michigan Legislature to stop funding to the university for what they said was promoting illegal acts, under Michigan's sodomy laws.
Now, the class has re-appeared and the sodomy law has been overturned and the Christian Right is worried that Professor Haleprin is working hard to change all of the men at the U of M into happy homos. It's a bad time for straight-laced america when it seems that the whole country is going gay around them, and they are ready once again to stand up and scream about it.
But there are students on the U of M campus who are coming out, and a class like Haleprin's could be just the thing they need. There's also a level of understanding and tolerance that could be gained by having other students see what gay men go through to find themselves, and be able to see what shapes our worlds.
Unlike Christianity, recruiting someone to be gay isn't really possible, but there are touchstones, little experiences and references that are shared by so many of us in the community. They deserve to be looked at. The idea of Gay and Lesbian studies is still young, and there's still a lot of psychological and cultural work that needs to be done to bring understanding even to members of the community itself. It's going to take constant pressure from us to get courses like this on the curriculum, and and even harder fight to keep them there when there's constant pressure to kill them, for both funding and religious reasons.
Although the name of the class is apt, it's also inflammatory, and that's precisely why it's there, nothing shocks people more than being open and honest about a fear, no matter how unfounded it is. The class should be eye opening for some, life altering for others, and certainly applauded for exploring a formerly taboo subject.
For many school starts this week or the next. Millions of students return to the classroom and college students work towards their degrees, or at least the next great party. Many of those students will stick to the basic courses, following a degree plan and working to get out to and get a job.
Others will find much more. College can be a great time of discovery and awakening, away from the family and exposed to different ways of thinking. Often there are courses, and professors that challenge and enlighten.
At the University of Michigan this fall professor David Haleprin will be gearing up for another semester teaching the provocatively titled class, How To Be Gay: Male Homosexuality and Initiation.
The class explores what aspects of gay society are taught and learned as opposed to being innate. As we know, the gay community is diverse, but there are stereotypes. Camp, drag, muscle culture, style, fashion, and a love of show tunes are all attributed to being gay, but not everyone shares these traits. How do these stereotypes get created, and why do people perpetuate them? Why do gay men seem to flock to Cher, Madonna and Judy Garland?
The class allows students not only to learn about gay culture, but experience gay life through a required class project. There are also screenings of movies and shows that seem to form the backbone of gay reference points, both with gay messages, such as the Boys in The Band, and not, such as Mommie Dearest. The students will examine several gay culture references, looking at gay identity from the social practices and cultural identifications and learning how a separate culture has developed.
Folks, they are going to a gay bar.
One of the questions the class asks is how much of these references, and the images and practices of gay culture are a part of an individual's coming out and eventual identity. The class is also focused on how one not only identifies with gay culture, but also how one disassociates with the stereotype, saying "I'm gay, but I'm not like that". One might see Priscilla, Queen of The Desert and both identify with the character's plights, but never want to become a drag queen.
The question: Is there a textbook?
So here's a class that explores the gay subculture, and what it means to the identity of gays. Of course the class is tragically named. Rather than just calling the class "Gay Studies" or "Gay Culture", Prof. Haleprin wants publicity and interest in his class. Obviously, How To Be Gay is a provocative name, meant to stand out among all of the other classes. Then to add "An Initiation" further provokes those who believe it's a choice. The problem is, it attracts ire form those who choose not to understand.
Haleprin and the university are under fire by a group known as the American Family Association. As you probably already know, any group with the word "family" in it is pretty much not going to be rationally thinking about gay rights. The class has been under fire before by the same group. The group states that they don't want taxpayers money to go to such a class. This, of course is the nice, polite argument from the group.
The true fear is exposed by the Center for Reclaiming America, their website calls the class a "Homosexual Training Course." They and others were pleased when the course was cancelled a few years ago due to public pressure and lobbing of the Michigan Legislature to stop funding to the university for what they said was promoting illegal acts, under Michigan's sodomy laws.
Now, the class has re-appeared and the sodomy law has been overturned and the Christian Right is worried that Professor Haleprin is working hard to change all of the men at the U of M into happy homos. It's a bad time for straight-laced america when it seems that the whole country is going gay around them, and they are ready once again to stand up and scream about it.
But there are students on the U of M campus who are coming out, and a class like Haleprin's could be just the thing they need. There's also a level of understanding and tolerance that could be gained by having other students see what gay men go through to find themselves, and be able to see what shapes our worlds.
Unlike Christianity, recruiting someone to be gay isn't really possible, but there are touchstones, little experiences and references that are shared by so many of us in the community. They deserve to be looked at. The idea of Gay and Lesbian studies is still young, and there's still a lot of psychological and cultural work that needs to be done to bring understanding even to members of the community itself. It's going to take constant pressure from us to get courses like this on the curriculum, and and even harder fight to keep them there when there's constant pressure to kill them, for both funding and religious reasons.
Although the name of the class is apt, it's also inflammatory, and that's precisely why it's there, nothing shocks people more than being open and honest about a fear, no matter how unfounded it is. The class should be eye opening for some, life altering for others, and certainly applauded for exploring a formerly taboo subject.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
I forgot to include a subject (pt 2)
Date: 2003-08-26 10:25 pm (UTC)This point is almost gratuitous. It's akin to pointing out that the KKK has spoken out against affirmative action. I don't have any experience with the Center for Reclaiming America, but I do have lots of experience with the AFA. I don't think it's a stretch to say that the AFA is considered radical even by most conservatives. My father, a Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (almost as conservative as they come) pastor, gets the AFA Journal (published monthly) and pays no heed to their articles since most of them are about things like how everyone should be boycotting Disney because it's part of the Liberal Conspiracy to turn America into the next Gomorrah, and how anyone who buys Ben 'n Jerry's ice cream is helping erode the moral soil of Our Great Nation.
You actually come tantalizingly close to tying the information presented by the paragraphs addressing Point 4 in with a larger theme with the sentence, "The true fear is exposed by the Center for Reclaiming America, their website calls the class a 'Homosexual Training Course.'" I think that instead of focusing on the radical right's reaction specifically (that's always going to be anti-gay) you might do better to bring up the way that the radical right can influence the right-of-center crowd. This could be presented as a point regarding Question 3; that is, if the class is presented in an inflammatory way, the right-of-center are going to be far more willing to accept the radical right's interpretation. If, however, the class were named something akin to "Homosexual Studies," it might attract a few less "Look how gay I am!" types but would also be more palatable to moderate conservatives.
5. Gay studies needs to be addressed more frequently and openly in academic environments
This might seem like an odd thing to list as a possible point of contention, but the way it's presented in this paper makes it sound like less of a postulate and more of a conclusion. Indeed, it is a debatable point. The last number I heard for the gay/straight ratio was like 1:20 for men, 1:33 for women. Since even women's studies (in a sociological context) is still in its relative infancy and women make up roughly 52% of the world's population, perhaps we're expecting too much from the slow-to-catch-on academic community. It's a pretty lame argument but I'm sure that an intelligent person with a more homophobic bias would be able to come up with a much better one.
So, to reiterate, I think all you're really missing is a touch of focus and cohesion. Oh wait, you already knew that. Um, given the direction of the work you've already done, I would focus on the legitimacy aspect. Gently swaying those moderate conservatives is, in my opinion, the absolute best thing that the gay community can do for itself right now. While the idea may be repugnant to many of us "enlightened" folk, the fact remains that they are in the majority, we are in the minority, and until we can find a way to appeal to their sense of logic or pragmatism or whatever it is that keeps us from being the misogynist homophobes that they are, the gap shall remain forever unbridged.
Again, when reading these comments please keep in mind that the last writing class I took was Honors English in tenth grade, so even though I try to look authoritative on the subject I'm mostly just talking out of my
pink puckering assholeexperience as a reader, not a wordsmith. I did find the piece to be quite edifying and I hope you manage to polish it to your satisfaction.Cheers