Queer Studies Advances Cause

The movement for queer studies at Harvard passed a milestone this week—it now has a name.

And within the next month a group of Harvard professors plan to submit a proposal to the administration for the establishment of a permanent committee to be called the Committee on Studies of Gender and Sexuality.

This marks the first formal attempt to establish at Harvard a home for a discipline already officially recognized by many other universities.

This discipline involves the study of queer theory—which focuses on deconstructing and questioning society’s definitions of gender and sexuality—and the study of gay and lesbian lifestyles and identity.

“Queer studies is about what thinking about sexuality can teach us about identity and desire in general,” says Lecturer on Literature Heather K. Love ’91.

But, given the recent weariness of the Harvard Faculty to add new departments and committees—especially ones that revolve around a specific subculture—the proponents of the new queer studies committee hope to show that their field concerns more than a narrow part of the population.

“Everyone has a gender and a sexuality—this field is not narrow, but rather incredibly expansive,” Love says.

University President Lawrence H. Summers says he agrees that queer studies could potentially effect a broad range of disciplines.

“I don’t think that there is any question that issues of identity...is crucial in a range of intellectual areas,” Summers says.

Love and Professor of Romance Languages and Literature Bradley S. Epps have served as the organizers of the group of around a dozen Faculty members who will push the administration to consider adding queer studies as an official standing Faculty committee.

Supporters say this committee—which would not be a formal department or even grant degrees—would provide “curricular space” for work that Harvard students are already pursuing in queer and gay and lesbian studies.

“We want to go about developing some sense of how one would go about pursuing an interest in this field in a logical way,” Love says.

Such work could include compiling lists of courses that would fall into the category of queer studies as well as informing students of Faculty members who would be willing to serve as advisors for theses on queer topics.

“As it is now, classes that address these issues are housed in various departments and are often hard for students to find,” Epps said.

And this leads to frustration among students interested in queer studies, says Daniel R. Tremitiere ’02-’03, co-president of the Bisexual, Gay, Lesbian, Transgender and Supporters’ Alliance (BGLTSA).

“For students with interests in queer studies there is no structure to support them and no funding. It is very important that we have space set aside in the academic sphere for this,” he says.

What’s in a Name?

Ten of the 18 Faculty members who have signed onto this initiative met for the second time Tuesday to discuss, among other things, what to call their proposed committee.

They agreed upon Studies of Gender and Sexuality—a name that was seen as the most inclusive by Faculty and the received the most student support in a survey conducted through the BGLTSA this week.

But to some, the name seems a unfortunate compromise, indicative of the continued public uneasiness with homosexuality.

“I believe that it is necessary for certain phrases like ‘queer’ to enter the public prose,” Epps says.

Another potential problem with the proposed name discussed by the Faculty at Tuesday’s meeting is its overlap with already established degree-granting women’s studies committee.

Mari Ruti, a lecturer on women’s studies who is also serving on the committee established by Epps and Love, says the women’s studies committee needs to define the relationship between women’s studies and the new queer studies committee, so that the two committees reinforce—and not detract from—each other.

“Many of our women’s studies professors are involved in this new [queer studies] committee and are very supportive and excited about this new effort,” she says.

Ruti also emphasizes that while women’s studies and queer studies both address some of the same issues, they are separate disciplines and ought to be treated as such.

“Housing the committee under women’s studies would unfairly emphasize the category of women over the category of gays and lesbians,” Ruti says.

On Other Campuses

As part of their effort to establish the new queer studies committee, Faculty plan to cite the existence of queer studies programs at other universities.

“Students here have no way to compare their experience to what is going on at other schools—and Harvard doesn’t look good,” Love says.

Yale University has had a degree-granting program in Women and Gender Studies since 1998.

“Students on our campus are being heard in many ways in which students on other campuses are not,” said Marianne LeFrance, chair of Yale’s Fund for Lesbian and Gay Studies.

In 1994 Brown University founded a sexuality and society major, which draws faculty from a number of different departments.

According to Gretchen M. Schultz, the chair of that program, Brown’s program is well-received by that university’s administration.

“The Brown administration is consistently reaching out in support of new programs and disciplines,” Schultz says.

Given the presence of such programs at other university, Laure “Voop” de Vulpillieres ’02, the Harvard student who founded the New England Queer College organization, says the differences between Harvard and its peer institutions are troubling.

“Harvard is a lot less invested in its queer students and this is only going to lead to a greater sense of alienation of the queer community,” she says.

To prove the legitimacy and importance of the field, interested students have begun to organize their support for the Faculty’s efforts. They plan on forming their own group to promote greater academic support for queer studies.

“Epps and Love have gone above and beyond the call of duty and have demonstrated a passion and energy not often found among Harvard professors,” Tremitiere says. “But there is no question that students should and need to take an active role in these efforts.”

—Staff writer Jessica E. Vascellaro can be reached at vascell@fas.harvard.edu.