UC Santa Cruz has a strong commitment to queer studies and the critical study of sexualities and genders, evident in a wide range of course offerings, faculty interest, and research programs in these areas. Courses with queer content can be found in departments such as Anthropology, Critical Race & Ethnic Studies, Feminist Studies, Film + Digital Media, History, History of Consciousness, Legal Studies, Literature, Sociology, and Theater Arts.
Although UCSC does not yet have a major or minor in Sexuality Studies, majors as Feminist Studies, Sociology, and Literature, to name a few, have sufficient flexibility to allow students to design a course of study that will enable them to explore these interests. For students who prefer to take a more self-directed course of study, there is the option of designing an independent major.
News & Announcements
Congratulations to Associate Professor Xavier Livermon (FMST/CRES) on the publication of his new book, Kwaito Bodies: Remastering Space and Subjectivity in Post-Apartheid South Africa. Drawing on fieldwork in Johannesburg's nightclubs and analyses of musical performances and recordings, Professor Livermon examines the cultural politics of the youthful black body in South Africa through the performance, representation, and consumption of kwaito, a style of electronic dance music that emerged following the end of apartheid. Livermon approaches his subject with a black queer and black feminist studies framework and shows how kwaito culture operates as an alternative politics that challenges the dominant constructions of gender and sexuality and notions of acceptable femininity and masculinity,
