English 107 - Spring, 2018

Freedom of Expression

Class Information

Instructor: Frederickson, Kathleen
CRN: 81967
Time: TR 3:10-4:30
Location: 113 Hoagland

Description

This course will examine the shifting legal and economic landscapes that pornography has occupied in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Feminists have lobbied both for and against pornography: pornography has been seen to produce sexual imagination and expressiveness on the one hand, and to constitute harassment, exploitation, and violence on the other. This course will ask about how and why pornography circulates, looking at obscenity law as well as at zoning, labor conditions, and shifts in feminist and queer politics since the 1970s.

Readings will include the following:
Books:
Delany Times Square Red, Times Square Blue
MacKinnon Only Words

Selections from Joan Nestle, Gayle Rubin, Mireille Miller-Young, Whitney Strub, Lucas Hildebrand, and others.

Grading

Paper 1: 25%
Paper 2: 30%
Midterm: 20%
Final: 20%
Participation: 5%