Representations of Gender, Love and Sexuality (Level 5)

• Credit value: 30 credits at Level 5 
• Convenor: Professor Joanne Leal 
• Tutors: Professor Joanne Leal, Dr Damian Catani, Dr Nicolette David, Professor Luciana Martins
• Assessment: a 1.5-hour in-class test (50%) and 2500-word essay (50%)

In this module we explore various ways in which gender, love and sexuality have been represented and performed at different times, in different cultural contexts and within different cultural media.

Taking this module will help you understand the reasons for these differences in cultural production. You will learn about the socio-historical contexts in which the texts were produced, and the social and cultural norms to which they were responding and reacting.

Indicative syllabus

• Love, duty and desire in the Early Romantic novel: La Princesse de Clèves; The Sorrows of Young Werther
• Casualties of desire: Death in Venice and The Reader
• Nineteenth-century romantic sex: Chateaubriand
• Twentieth-century feminist sex: Simone de Beauvoir
• Representing sex work in Japanese cinema: The Insect Woman; Street of Shame
• Women in and out of love: Annie Ernaux

By the end of this module, you will understand some of the key concepts from psychoanalytic, gender, post-colonial and political theory which relate to these issues and will be encouraged to make these critical perspectives productive for your own interpretive practice.