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Well, here I am... another person who forgot to post about the outside events I attended this semester! I actually went to quite a few that "counted," so here are my thoughts on a few which I found particularly relevant and interesting both in relation to class and on a personal level.

I went to see Slippery Slope back in September, which I found both entertaining and useful in thinking about sex work and the porn industry. I actually ended up writing a paper about the movie for my sociology class in which I analyzed it through the lens of symbolic interactionism (a theory which basically emphasizes the importance of meanings that people develop about objects/people/etc. in their lives based on their social interactions/experiences, and that they act based on those meanings... basically, the punchline is that people act toward situations rather than toward systems). I thought a lot about how Gillian, the main character, is so confident in her feminist ideals and ways of making sure her relationship is equal, and yet she finds out that her views (which my professor used the term "functionalism" to describe in her comments on my paper--basically, a simplified view of how people fit into systems and act based on them) are actually quite limited. Through becoming a part of the porn industry herself, she is able to learn about the kinds of circumstances that actually lead people to do that kind of work... both through interacting with the women who work on the movies, and through being put in a similar (though obviously different in many ways) position herself. There were a lot of interesting layers to the movie, such as the role dynamics between Gillian and her husband, the role of Michaela (the female producer who runs things) as a woman who uses her sexuality as power, and Gillian's sexual awakening. I thought it was great--lots to enjoy and laugh at on a surface level, but plenty of depth as well. Seeing the movie, and thinking about it through writing my paper, informed my thinking about sex work when we got to that part of the class later in the semester. It made me think about how hard it is to judge the moral "rightness" of something like sex work when there are so many different reasons people wind up doing it, and when those involved do not necessarily view it as degrading. Who are we to judge their lives for them, especially without having been in the same place ourselves?

Another event that I attended, which was not mentioned in class, but which I found extremely interesting and significant in my own thinking about gender and sexuality, was one that kjmason already mentioned below: Andrea Gibson's spoken word performance. I've done a lot of thinking over the last couple of years about the interplay between gender/feminism and artistic expression, and I find spoken word poetry to be such an interesting medium for conveying feelings and ideas. There were so many moments in her performance when there was some turn of words that was just so tight and beautiful that the audience could feel it in a way that theory and academic writing just can't quite convey... and in a way that written poetry is capable of creating, but it was really in the hearing it, being in that moment and hearing and feeling the rhythm of the words... that gave the words even more meaning on both an intellectual and visceral level. On the level of content, her work covered so many different issues that people often do not approach, or may not relate in the ways she did... so many of her poems touched on painful experiences of rape, sexual abuse, inequality based on sexual orientation, the country's current war and its effects on veterans, religion, etc. I went to Andrea Gibson's performance before we went to Kate Bornstein's performance, but hearing Kate call herself an "artist in service of activism" rather than an activist has made me think about Andrea Gibson's work in the context of activism as well. Andrea does identify as an activist (the splash page for her website says "andrea gibson::poet::activist"), and I do see her work as activism. She tours frequently, reading her work that integrates the personal and political and which has such a power that it really touches people and raises their awareness about the issues she reads about, potentially inciting them to take action, or even just to have their own realizations about their lives and/or the larger political/social context they are a part of.

I bought two of her albums (Yellowbird and Swarm), and two of my favorite poems are Blue Blanket (http://www.andreagibson.org/poems/poems_blueblanket.html) and Dive (http://www.andreagibson.org/poems/poems_dive.html), though I think all of her work is excellent!

Since I am woefully deficient of forum postings, I figured I might as well talk about one more event: Suzan-Lori Parks' reading. I almost didn't go to this one since I wasn't familiar with her work, and have found over the last couple years that I tend to enjoy readings more when I am familiar with the poet's work, or at least know a bit of his/her biography beforehand... but after my other professor urged us to go, too, I decided to give it a shot anyway. I am so glad I did! As others have mentioned, her "reading" consisted more of her talking about how she got where she did, and offering advice to the audience, all of which I thought was great. A couple of points that particularly stuck with me were her suggestion that we "entertain all of our far out ideas," and her advice that if a person who we greatly respect offers us a piece of advice that jives with what we're feeling, that we should take it... but if it does not jive with what's in us, that we can let their advice go. Basically, she seemed to emphasize having confidence in your own convictions and running with your ideas instead of shooting them down before they have a chance to develop. This really resonated with me, since those are things I have a really hard time doing on a regular basis. I thought that her way of presenting all of this was interesting (with the sound effects, hand gestures, etc.), and it all really stuck with me, as well... when I think of the things she said, I also think of the gestures she made, and that seems to add something to it... makes it stick on a level beyond just cognitive understanding.

Overall, I am glad that we were required to attend events for class, and I found that I ended up going to things just because I wanted to anyway... but I liked being made aware of what was going on, and these outside events definitely added to my experience & thinking in this class and others!