What does it mean to be a man, To be a white man, an African American
man? A father?  How does a "real" woman behave - and why?  This course
looks at the kinds of answers to these questions offered to us by popular
culture.  Using fiction, film and autobiography we will critically examine
what kind of options are made available to use as men and women, and what
kinds of limitations are placed upon the performance of gender.

The course places an emphasis on how ideals ideals and norms of gender
vary across different sexualities, races and nationalities.  For this
reason, films and texts for the course have been chosen to reflect diverse
cultures and disciplines, ranging from anthropological accounts of
sub-Saharan societies where men take part in beauty contests, to the
autobiography of an Asian American woman confronting the limits of gender
and ethnicity, to the powerful masculine images communicated through
Hollywood cyborg films.  Course readings also include manifestos from
movements that have struggled to change perceptions of men and women in
America.  The aim of the course as a whole is to create room for
discussion and debate about current representations of gender and to
imagine new possibilities for the men and women of the future.