Queer studies
Queer studies, sexual diversity studies, or LGBTQ studies is the study of topics relating to sexual orientation and gender identity usually focusing on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, gender dysphoric, asexual, aromantic, queer, questioning, and intersex people and cultures.
Originally centered on LGBT history and literary theory, the field has expanded to include the academic study of issues raised in archaeology, sociology, psychiatry, anthropology, the history of science, philosophy, psychology, sexology, political science, ethics, communication, and other fields by an examination of the identity, lives, history, and perception of being queer.
Queer studies is not the same as queer theory, which is an analytical viewpoint within queer studies that challenges the existence of "socially constructed" categories of sexual identity.
Background
Queer refers to the implicit identity of gender and sex and how it is integrated into individuals' lives. It can function as an adjective, verb, or noun. In academia, queer has become a mode of analysis recognizing the intersectionality of sex, gender, and sexuality intersecting with aspects of human identity such as class, race, age, and ethnicity. Once considered a slur, queer now encompasses inclusivity in the 21st century. Some people find that the term "queer studies" is more defining of universal experiences compared to "LGBTQ+ Studies."Many topics within queer studies focus on the open possibilities beyond heteronormativity; detailing texts, cultural artifacts produced by queer individuals, as well as expanding beyond into how queer interacts with daily life.
Though a new discipline, a growing number of colleges have begun offering academic programs on the expansive topics of queer. This has been a trend in higher education since the early 90's.
Queer as a reclaimed slur
The term Queer itself has become the topic of controversy over the reclaiming of a word which has been used against LGBTQ+ individuals for the last century. There is an ongoing debate within the community itself between the use of LGBTQ+ studies or queer studies. LGBTQ+ provides a more categorical description of its subjects. In contrast, queer has a history of going from being a common descriptor for someone who exhibited any emotion from happy to drunk in the 19th century to being used as a slur against same-sex individuals in the 20th century. The term did not have an implicit sexual definition until the early 20th century, and reclamation of the slur started during the late 80's and 90's. This was a response to the overall LGBTQ+ movement, with influence from the AIDS crisis of the time. Some people believe that "queer" expands the definition without categorical labels, while others reject the term due to its harmful history.History
During the 1920s, same-sex subcultures were beginning to become more established in several larger US cities. Studies centering around queer life and culture originated in the 1970s with the publication of several "seminal works of gay history. Inspired by ethnic studies, women's studies, and similar identity-based academic fields influenced by the critical theory of the Frankfurt School, the initial emphasis was on "uncovering the suppressed history of gay and lesbian life;" it also made its way into literature departments, where the emphasis was on literary theory. Queer theory soon developed, challenging the "socially constructed" categories of sexual identity.The first undergraduate course in the United States on LGBTQ studies was taught at the University of California, Berkeley in the spring of 1970. It was followed by similar courses in the fall of 1970 at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville and at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.
According to Harvard University, the City University of New York began the first university program in gay and lesbian studies in 1986. The City College of San Francisco claims to be the "First Queer Studies Department in the U.S.", with English instructor Dan Allen developing one of the first gay literature courses in the country in the fall of 1972, and the college establishing what it calls "the first Gay and Lesbian Studies Department in the United States" in 1989. Then-department chair Jonathan David Katz was the first tenured faculty in queer studies in the country. Hobart and William Smith Colleges in upstate New York were among the first to offer a full-fledged major in LGBTQ Studies in the late 1990s. These colleges currently have one of the few tenure lines in a stand-alone LGBT Studies program, while many such programs are being absorbed into Women and Gender Studies programs.
Historians John Boswell and Martin Duberman made Yale University a notable center of lesbian and gay studies in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Each historian published several books on gay history; Boswell held three biennial conferences on the subject at the university, and Duberman sought to establish a center for lesbian and gay studies there in 1985. However, Boswell died in 1994, and in 1991, Duberman left for the City University of New York, where he founded its Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies. A 1993 alumnus gift evolved into the faculty committee-administered Fund for Lesbian and Gay Studies, which developed a listing of courses relevant to lesbian and gay studies called the "Pink Book" and established a small lending library named for Boswell. The committee began to oversee a series of one-year visiting professorships in 1994.
Anti-gay curriculum laws
Anita Bryant, a popular face in the media and widely known by the public, was at the forefront of the "Save Our Children" movement in 1977, born in response to an Oklahoma ordinance criminalizing discrimination due to sexual preference. This campaign aimed to discourage the hiring of homosexual schoolteachers. Bryant claimed that they would molest the children and wrongfully serve as an example that any marriage outside of one between a man and a woman is respectable. The movement and its publicity gained Bryant much public support and eventually resulted in the overturning of the gay rights ordinance just half a year after it was implemented.Bryant's campaign caught the attention of California state Senator John Briggs, who eagerly expressed his interest in expanding the Save Our Children campaign to his state, which initially took the form of Proposition 6 or the Briggs Initiative. This initiative allowed for employment discrimination against those who engaged in homosexual activity in public, or publicly encouraged or promoted homosexual activity towards co-workers and their students. Unlike Bryant's movement, which focused solely on gay teachers, Briggs' campaign could be applied to homosexual and heterosexual people alike since his initiative discriminated against the discussion of homosexual behavior, which anyone could do. Briggs' initiative was ultimately denied in 1978.
Yale–Kramer controversy
In 1997, writer and AIDS activist Larry Kramer offered his alma mater, Yale, $4 million the study of and/or instruction in gay male literature..." including a tenured position, "and/or 2) the establishment of a gay student center at Yale..."With gender, ethnic, and race-related studies still relatively new, Yale Provost Alison Richard said that gay and lesbian studies was too narrow a specialty for a program in perpetuity, indicating a wish to compromise on some of the conditions Kramer had asserted. Negotiations broke down as Kramer, frustrated by what he perceived to be "homophobic" resistance, condemned the university in a front-page story in The New York Times. According to Kramer, he subsequently received letters from more than 100 institutions of higher learning "begging me to consider them."
In 2001, Yale accepted a $1 million grant from his older brother, money manager Arthur Kramer, to establish the Larry Kramer Initiative for Lesbian and Gay Studies. The five-year program aimed to bring in visiting faculty, host conferences and lectures, and coordinate academic endeavors in lesbian and gay studies. Jonathan David Katz assumed the role of executive coordinator in 2002; in 2003, he commented that while women's studies or African American studies have been embraced by American universities, lesbian and gay studies have not. He blamed institutionalized fear of alienating alumni of private universities, or legislators who fund public ones. The five-year program ended in 2006.
In June 2009, Harvard University announced that it would establish an endowed chair in LGBT studies. Believing the post to be "the first professorship of its kind in the country," Harvard President Drew G. Faust called it "an important milestone." Funded by a $1.5 million gift from the members and supporters of the Harvard Gay & Lesbian Caucus, the F. O. Matthiessen Visiting Professorship of Gender and Sexuality is named for a mid-20th century gay Harvard American studies scholar and literary critic who chaired the undergraduate program in history and literature. Harvard Board of Overseers member Mitchell L. Adams said, "This is an extraordinary moment in Harvard's history and in the history of this rapidly emerging field... And because of Harvard's leadership in academia and the world, this gift will foster continued progress toward a more inclusive society."
Academic field of queer studies
The concept of perverse presentism is often taught in queer studies classes at universities. This is the understanding that queer history cannot and should not be analyzed through contemporary perspectives. Ways to find out how people historically identified can include studying queer community archives.While queer studies initially emerged in the North American and, to a lesser extent, European academy and mostly relates to Western contexts, it recently has also developed in other parts of the world. For instance, since the 2000s there has been an emergent field of Queer African Studies, with leading scholars such as Stella Nyanzi, Keguro Macharia, Zethu Matebeni, S.N. Nyeck, Kwame E. Otu, and Gibson Ncube contributing to the development of this field. Their work critiques the eurocentric orientation of Western queer studies and examines the longstanding traditions of sexual and gender diversity, ambiguity, and fluidity in African cultures and societies.