HIS 459 - Topics in American History

This course challenges popular views of rape as existing outside of history. Instead of a universal human expression, both the act and idea of rape have histories situated in specific contexts. We will focus on the region that is now the United States from prior to European colonization through the twenty-first century. In doing so, we will center the experiences of women and girls, who have in the past and who now continue to experience sexual violence at higher rates than men and boys, but our study is neither exclusive nor restrictive. Recognizing the limitations of current scholarship, we will consider rape comprehensively with attention to gender, race, ethnicity, class, age, nationality, and sexual orientation. We will distinguish among acts of rape, narratives about rape told in specific moments, and the evolution of broader cultural understandings of rape’s meanings and purposes. We will balance our discussions of violence with those of resistance, and in centering survivors and their resilience, we will rewrite/re(right) narratives that have perpetuated victimization and train ourselves to engage the rape discourses that exist today.

Satisfies Gender and Sexuality Studies major and minor requirement

Prerequisites & Notes
Instructor permission required.