Course outline

Posted on | June 30, 2009 | 13 Comments

Thanks very much for all the tips as this was coming together. Since I was moving house yesterday, the day the reader was due, I’ve written something based on what I already know rather than what I hope to get across before giving the lectures. I’ve got a bag of books about romance packed for in-flight reading this afternoon! Cavell is winning so far.

One thing I would like more help with is finding anything recent, non-cynical, even celebratory about love and marriage from a gender or cultural studies perspective. I guess I’m really asking for readings in media and cultural studies rather than critical theory/philosophy. The previous version of this course was quite philosophy-heavy, and I’m trying to do something a little different, as the following will show…

I suppose since I am teaching a gender studies course about love and proposed to a bloke, this is a point of interest in other ways too…

WEEK 1 Introduction
27 July

Reading
· Dale Carnegie, Selections from ‘Six Ways To Make People Like You’, in How to Win Friends and Influence People (Revised edition) Eden, North Ryde, 1988; [Original publication 1936].

PART ONE: GETTING INTIMATE

WEEK 2 Friendship and Authenticity
3 August

Reading
· Erving Goffman, ‘Regions and Region Behavior’, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, The Overlook Press, New York, 1973

Further Reading
· ‘Genuine Twitterati Earn Seals of Approval’, The Australian, 16/6/09
· Jason Kincaid, ‘The Fake Follow Becomes A Reality With FriendFeed’s New Design’, Tech Crunch (online) 25/8/08

WEEK 3 Friendship and Distinction
10 August

Reading
· Pierre Bourdieu, ‘Elective Affinities’, in Distinction: A Social
Critique of the Judgement of Taste, Richard Nice (trans) Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1984.

Further Reading
· Jason Wilson, ‘“Digital White Flight”? Facebook, Class and Social
Networking’, New Media Research Group Blog

WEEK 4 Intimacy and Privacy
17 August

Reading
· Emily Nussbaum, ‘Kids, the Internet and the End of Privacy’, The
Weekend Australian Magazine, March 24-5, 2007

Further Reading
· http://postsecret.blogspot.com/
· http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com/
· http://secrettweet.com/

WEEK 5 Public Friendship
24 August

Reading
· John B. Thompson, ‘Self and Experience in a Mediated World’, The Media and Modernity: A Social Theory of the Media, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1995.

Further Reading
· Christine Rosen, ‘Virtual Friendship and the New Narcissism’ The New Atlantis, Summer 2007.
· Graeme Turner, Understanding Celebrity, Sage, London, 2004.

PART TWO: FALLING IN LOVE

WEEK 6 The Love Plot
31 August

Reading

· Lauren Berlant, ‘Love, a Queer Feeling’ in Tim Dean and Christopher Lane (eds) Homosexuality and Psychoanalysis, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2001.

Further Reading
· Plato, Symposium, (trans Robin Waterfield), Oxford University Press, 1994.
· Linnell Secomb, ‘Ch 1: Sapphic and Platonic Erotics’, Philosophy and Love: From Plato to Popular Culture, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, 2007.
· John Armstrong, ‘The Romantic Vision’, Conditions of Love, WW Norton and Co, New York, 2002.
· Adam Phillips, ‘On Love’, On Flirtation, Harvard University Press,
Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1994.

WEEK 7 I Want To Know What Love Is!
7 September

No readings; Students lead lecture

WEEK 8 Moving in Together
14 September

Reading
· William H. Whyte, ‘The Web of Friendship’ and ‘The Outgoing Life’,
from The Organization Man Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1963 [Originally published 1956]

Further Reading
· Jacqui Taffel, ‘Love keeps its distance’, Sydney Morning Herald
· Katy Guest, ‘Loving together and living apart’, The Independent
· Zygmunt Bauman, ‘Falling In and Out of Love’, Liquid Love: On the
Fragility of Human Bonds, Polity, Cambridge, 2003.

WEEK 9 Getting Married
21 September

Reading
· Judith Butler, ‘Is Kinship Always Already Heterosexual?’ differences, 13.1, 2002.

Further Reading
· Kath Weston, Families We Choose: Lesbians, Gays, Kinship, Columbia University Press, New York, 1991.
· Michael Warner, The Trouble with Normal: Sex, Politics, and the Ethics of Queer Life, Free Press, New York, 1999.
· http://www.beyondmarriage.org/

—MID-SEMESTER BREAK: 28 September-2 October—

PART THREE: THE USES OF FRIENDSHIP

WEEK 10 Intimate Citizenship
5 October

Reading
· Melissa Gregg, ‘Normal Homes’, M/C Journal “Home” Vol 10, 4 (August 2007)

Further Reading
· Michael Warner, ‘Public and Private’ in Publics and Counterpublics,
New York: Zone Books; Cambridge, Mass: Distributed by MIT Press, 2002.
· Lauren Berlant, ‘Introduction: Intimacy, Publicity, and Femininity’,
in The Female Complaint: The Unfinished Business of Sentimentality in
American Culture
· Lauren Berlant, The Queen of America Goes to Washington City: Essays on Sex and Citizenship, Duke University Press, Durham, 1997.

WEEK 11 Friends With Benefits
12 October

Reading
· Michel Foucault, ‘Friendship as a Way of Life’, in Michel Foucault:
Ethics: Essential Works of Foucault 1954-1984, Vol 1, Paul Rabinow (ed), Penguin, London, 2000.
· Herman Nilson, ‘Aesthetics of Existence,’ Michel Foucault and the
Games of Truth, (trans Rachel Clark), MacMillan Press, London, 1998.

Further Reading
· Dossie Easton and Catherine A Liszt, The Ethical Slut: A Guide to
Infinite Sexual Possibilities, Greenery Press, San Francisco, 1997.

WEEK 12 The Commercialisation of Intimacy
19 October

Reading
· Alison Hearn, ‘Variations on the Branded Self: Theme, Invention,
Improvisation and Inventory’, in The Media and Social Theory, David
Hesmondhalgh and Jason Toynbee (eds), Routledge, London, 2008.

Further Reading
· Ned Rossiter, ‘‘YourSpace Is MyTime, Or, What Is The Lurking Dog Going To Do – Leave A Comment?’ Re-Public, (online)
· Mark Andrejevic, Reality TV: The Work of Being Watched, Rowman and Littlefield, Lanham, 2004.
· Anthony Giddens, The Transformation Of Intimacy : Sexuality, Love And Eroticism In Modern Societies, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1992.

WEEK 13 Compulsory Friendship
26 October

Reading
· Arlie Russell Hochschild, Selections from The Managed Heart:
Commercialization Of Human Feeling, Berkeley, University of California
Press, 1983.

Further Reading
· Alan Liu, The Laws of Cool: Knowledge Work and the Culture of
Information, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2004.
· Luc Boltanski and Eve Chiapello, The New Spirit of Capitalism, Gregory Elliot (trans) Verso, London, 2007.

Category: Teaching

Comments

13 Responses to “Course outline”

  1. Richard
    June 30th, 2009 @ 7:17 pm

    Hi Mel – This looks a fantastic outline. I’ve been teaching a course on cultural politics of friendship, also primarily from a theoretical/philosophical background, for a few years – and this is very refreshing! Sorry I can’t help with less curmudgeonly writings on love and marriage(!), but have you come across Sasha Roseneil and Shelley Budgeon’s research on friendship, care and intimacy? I can dig out some references if you haven’t… There’s also a great contextual piece on Foucault and friendship by Tom Roach, in New Formations 55 (2005). Best wishes, Richard (Bath Spa University, UK)

  2. glen
    June 30th, 2009 @ 10:05 pm

    fwb

    friendship as a way of life

    lol

  3. melgregg
    July 5th, 2009 @ 4:52 pm

    Thanks so much for the encouragement! This is my first ever solo-taught course, so I am quite nervous putting it together. The tutors have been silent since I sent them a copy, which I’m hoping isn’t a bad sign!!

    Definitely interested to have these references passed on Richard, thanks. I will also check out the Foucault piece. I must admit that I am trying not to use too much of his work in this course since he is featured in almost all of our unit offerings. But perhaps that is fitting for a gender and cultural studies program…

  4. LB
    July 7th, 2009 @ 5:11 am

    I don’t know about “recent, non-cynical, even celebratory about love and marriage from a gender or cultural studies perspective” but I’d look at Jane Gallop’s work. She says some amazingly unambivalent things about loving men in the interview I did with her called “Loose Lips” (sorry I don’t have a pdf now). It is in the “Our Monica Ourselves” book. Let me know if you want me to dig that out. I ought to know where it is!! Also Katherine Franke’s two essays, Longing for Loving and (especially) Theorizing Yes.
    LB

  5. Richard
    July 7th, 2009 @ 6:36 pm

    A couple of references, both archived at the University of Leeds CAVA Group:

    SHelley Budgeon & Sasha Roseneil, ‘Cultures of Intimacy and Care Beyond “The Family”: Friendship and Sexual/Love Relationships in the Twenty-First Century’- http://www.leeds.ac.uk/cava/papers/culturesofintimacy.htm

    Sasha Roseneil, ‘Why We Should Care About Friends: An Argument for Queering the Care Imaginary in Social Policy’, _Social Policy and Society_ 3:4 (October 2004), 409-20. [Earlier CAVA version available as: ‘Why We Should Care About Friends: some thoughts (for CAVA) about the ethics and practice of friendship’ – http://www.leeds.ac.uk/cava/papers/paper22sasha.htm

    There are further papers from a 2002 seminar on ‘friendship and non-conventional partnership’ here: http://www.leeds.ac.uk/cava/papers/intseminars.htm

    Hope these are useful! – Richard

  6. Rachel O'Reilly
    July 8th, 2009 @ 2:59 am

    Er – in addition to email, I forgot Jeremy
    Crampton, The Political Mapping of Cyberspace. Esp. chapters 3,4,5,7, on authenticity, parhhesia, privacy, positivity.
    Probably covers some of what you think is missing in terms of “recent / relevant” work within media and cultural theory?

  7. kate
    July 13th, 2009 @ 7:26 pm

    Lesbian Dad writes about marriage, including her own (in California, with all the legal ups and downs). It’s blog writing, but from someone with an intellectual background. She’s written about her relationship, commitment ceremony and legal marriage a few times http://www.lesbiandad.net/2008/07/11/groom/ might be a nice start though.

  8. melgregg
    July 14th, 2009 @ 6:37 pm

    Thanks so much, all of you. I went away for a break and came back to all these goodies! I will try to share what happens as all this takes further shape.

  9. Anna Hickey-Moody
    July 16th, 2009 @ 8:58 pm

    Hi Mel,

    This course looks wicked.

    Look, this isn’t an overly ‘academic’ suggestions but could well be coupled with other material and is a really interesting read:
    MARTHA ALBERTSON FINEMAN’s ‘The Autonomy Myth
    A [positive] Theory of Dependency’

    http://www.thenewpress.com/index.php?option=com_title&task=view_title&metaproductid=1012

    I read it last summer and it did a lot for my state of mind. Its celebratory about love and marriage from a gender studies/ legal studies perspective.

  10. Adrian Martin
    August 1st, 2009 @ 10:57 am

    Melissa, I hope you will be devoting quality time in class to the scene in THE MIRROR HAS TWO FACES where Prof. Barbra Streisand delivers an extraordinary lecture to her uni students on love and eroticism! Many useful tips on lecturing style can be gleaned from this spectacle (inc. leaving the podium and walking theatrically among the seated students, like Moses parting the waters!!) Within the plot, a neat twist: Jeff Bridges is present only for the bit he misconstrues as the sober ‘critique of romantic love’, and doesn’t hear the rest !! It is the ultimate university movie … but ammunition for your course can also be found in the dire THE LIFE OF DAVID GALE (Kevin Spacey summarises, in about 30 seconds flat, the Lacanian theory of love! – well, how many more seconds do you need?), and the amazing Aussie curio GROSS MISCONDUCT (1993), where Jimmy Smits dazzles impressionable teen student Naomi Watts (!) with his seductive philosophical rap on the links between love, sex and knowledge!! Not that you need to learn anything about that … ?!?!?!?!

  11. melgregg
    August 6th, 2009 @ 9:24 am

    Adrian, thank you as always for such inspiration! I will see what I can do!

    Sadly, I don’t think Professor Streisand had to spend much time begging for more than 8 tutorials to teach 248 students… which has been my challenge this past fortnight?!

  12. Jess
    September 23rd, 2009 @ 6:25 pm

    Hope it’s not too strange for your students to have read this – found it while researching Berlant.

    I’ve really enjoyed your course so far.

    Just want to suggest this article for next time:

    http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/weddings-i-prefer-funerals–theyre-far-more-real-20090915-fplv.html

  13. melgregg
    September 25th, 2009 @ 7:43 am

    Hi Jess, Nice to see you here! I used that article in my tutorials last week, so good to see we are on the same wavelength :-)

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