CSLC 270 Tales of Sexuality from the Couch, the Court, and the Confessional

This course will explore the psychology and biopolitics of sexual behavior in literature and film. The first unit, the couch, focuses on psychological theories of sexuality based on works by Freud, Foucault, Lacan, and Derrida. The second unit, the court, explores the biopolitical demands and legal consequences of acting out our sexual impulses. This unit, with texts by Agamben and Esposito, traces the dehumanization,  exploitation, and control of the body in authoritarian regimes. The third unit, the confessional, discusses the reproductive bias of spiritual or religious systems and the prohibition of sexual expression. This unit presents films with scenes or plots illustrating the struggle between body and mind. The three units together will ask how sexual impulses disrupt a given socio-political order. Students will evaluate the solutions to disruption offered by psychology (compromise), the court (crime and punishment according to a given society's laws), and religion (confessing sex acts to a religious official who will condemn them, impose penance, and absolve the transgressor).