Topics in Trans Studies

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

Across, beyond, over, through: the prefix “trans-” is on the move. Harboring a hefty history, “trans-” signals movement between languages and identities, genders and genres, cultures and nations. But is the “trans-” in “translation” the “trans-” in “transition”? And is the “trans-” in “transgender” the “trans-” in “transnational”? How have these terms traversed time and place? And how do these terms, which negotiate conceptual borders, travel across geopolitical ones? In this course, we’ll map multiple modes of "trans-," as they flicker between persons and places, words and worlds. Our intention will be to consider the tensions inlaid in literary and theoretical representations of transcreation, broadly conceived. Crucial to our consideration will be a comparative understanding of the poetics and politics of meaning-making. As we interpret the words we read, so too will we investigate the words we write. We’ll study the many critical and creative choices, both simple and sophisticated, that go into translating interpretations of a text to a reader. We will encounter multilingual works by authors and theorists such as Gloria E. Anzaldúa, Walter Benjamin, Camila Sosa Villada, Jorge Luis Borges, Roque Salas Rivera, Emily Apter, and torrin a. greathouse, among others.