David Henkin
Though shaped by human biology and universal evolutionary impulses, human sexual and romantic relations have varied widely among and within different societies and have changed dramatically over time.
This course explores some dimensions of that diversity and change in the social, cultural, and legal history of the United States since the American Revolution. Of particular interest is the complex and overlapping histories of the three distinct phenomena featured in the course title: cultural ideals of romantic emotional attachment; erotic norms, practices, and ideals; and most especially, the social and legal institutions that regulate and legitimate particular sexual and conjugal relationships.
Marriage, as judicial pronouncements and political campaigns remind us, remains a passionately contested institution that unsettles the boundaries of public and private life. Changes in marital laws, habits, and expectations also reflect and reinforce larger shifts in gender roles, the economy, race relations, attitudes toward age and aging, and the presence of government in ordinary life.
This seminar for ambitious writers opens a window onto that rich and complex history.
Most of our work consists of intensive discussion of recent scholarly work in the history of marriage and sexuality, alongside texts produced in the United States over the past 240 years, though we also have the opportunity to do some analytical and interpretive writing on the subject and to develop plans for potential creative and scholarly projects.
Requirements include timely completion of weekly reading assignments; active, consistent, and thoughtful participation in seminar discussion; short weekly writing exercises; two longer essays; and one mini-prospectus for a larger work.