While I have been, I think, pretty vocal about what I like and dislike about this class, I have decided to keep my evaluation private.  The reasons for this are varied and complex, and I won't bore you with the details.  In any case, I will be emailing my evaluation to Anne and Kaye.  It's been a pleasure.

This diffraction is not easy for me to write.  I think that’s because this class has left me feeling largely confused.  When we began the class, I saw myself as someone who loved Gender and Sexuality Studies—not so much the theories behind them as the case studies I read about and saw all around me (as a Biology major, I’ve noticed that I tend to reject the idea that one theory can explain all of gender or all of society—I think this is because in anthropological sense, there is no theory that computes to a scientific law.  This is, for me, a weakness and a strength).  The first reading by Barad caused me some distress, because I couldn’t understand why we were working so hard to connect physics and gender.  In my mind, physics and gender both connect to everything else (indeed, if you get philosophical enough, everything connects to everything else), but that doesn’t mean we should spend our time dissecting the connection.

            After Barad, I was further confused by the focus the course took on disability.  I think disability is an important topic, and one that merits discussion, but I didn’t feel like our discussions ever had anything to do with gender.  Once again, the sheer interdisciplinary-ness of the course had me feeling lost.

(TRIGGER WARNING)

Dear friends,

As has become my custom, I would like to introduce this web event with a short description of my motives and hopes.  I want to tell you how this web event came to be (a long story in this case), what I hope to communicate through this web event, and what future directions are possible.

            Allow me to start at the beginning.  In the past few weeks, I have found myself increasingly aggravated, confused, and above all inspired.  My aggravation stems largely from Haverford’s policies regarding rape and sexual assault, which seem to become more and more inadequate the more that I learn about them (for anyone who hasn’t already done so, I strongly recommend reading AmyMay’s web event Biological Discourse and Rape Culture at Haverford College and jmorgant’s web event “Consent is Sexy” at Haverford: Not Yet).  While my belief that the Haverford policies are insufficient was immediately strong and clear, I grew confused about how to effect change.  I pondered a variety of questions, including: