English

This course explores queer and trans screen cultures from film to television and digital media. Decentering white, cisgendered and male narratives that are often at the heart of studies of queer culture, the module introduces students to queer and trans stories that have been shaped – and often sidelined – by inequalities of race, class, (dis)ability, nationality, sexuality and gender identity. Drawing on debates about gendered and sexual fluidities and LGBTQ+ identity politics that have emerged from queer and trans studies, the course troubles the assumed relationship between visibility and progressive politics whilst considering questions of desire, authenticity, orientation, privilege, shame and pleasure. We ask: How do marginalised communities encounter and challenge the paradigms of dominant culture? (How) has digital production, distribution and exhibition transformed contemporary queer and trans representation? What are the conventions that shape understandings of queer and trans culture and the ongoing exclusions of multiply marginalised groups? Engaging with screen media alongside theoretical texts (and others that blur the lines between the two), students will consider radical approaches to the study of sexuality. Throughout, students will explore how contemporary media makers work through their attachments to and critiques of social movements of the twentieth century, with an attention to intersectionality, identity politics and the personal politics of social justice. 

What is to be known about the causes and mechanisms of conflicts? What factors and elements allow us to closely analyze them and can provide us with insight? What about the understanding of political decision makers' motivations and the construction of States' interests in times of crisis? This course establishes a theoretical grid of analysis to prepare for the study of the origins of conflict. By analyzing actors' interests, actions or policies through the application of international relations theory, it considers the motivations and intentions of the parties to the conflict. The course then attempts to "test" theories within the framework of case studies and answers research questions through methodological research.