Pedagogy Apr 2012

TeachingQuerellein the Composition Classroom

Rob Faunce

Abstract

Ruminating on the work of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick around failed pedagogy and a confused cat, I consider ways to provoke new streams of critical thought in my composition students around issues of gender and sexuality without “pointing.” Thinking about Jean Genet's novel Querelle and Rainer Werner Fassbinder's film of the same name, I delineate the specifics of how I teach these two difficult, often incomprehensible texts in an introductory class. In reviewing the confusion these works can provoke in student discourse upon reading and viewing the texts, I emphasize the role of disorientation and dislocation in the mapping of student thinking and writing, ultimately reemphasizing the importance of nondemagogic, malleable pedagogy in the teaching of sexuality and gender, particularly with composition students who are exploring and amplifying their voices. Teaching Querelle is like unleashing a virus of confusion and intrigue on student writers, but the incoherence it creates also creates opportunities to explore new ideas and horizons in these developing thinkers/writers.

Journal
Pedagogy
Published
2012-04-01
DOI
10.1215/15314200-1425047
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Open Access
Closed
Topics
discourse analysis writing pedagogy teacher development gender and writing
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References (13) · 2 in this index

  1. Alexander et al. (2009)
    The Queer Turn in Composition Studies: Reviewing and Assessing an Emerging Scho…
    College Composition and Communication
  2. Alleyne Richard . 2009. “Surrealism Helps Get Your Point Across,” Telegraph, September22, www.telegraph.co.uk…
  3. Berlant (2009)
    Sex without Optimism
  4. Bollas (1989)
    The Shadow of the Object: Psychoanalysis of the Unthought Known
  5. Fassbinder (1982)
    Querelle [feature film]
Show all 13 →
  1. Faunce (2009)
    Queer and Nondemagogic Pedagogy
  2. Genet (1947)
    Querelle
  3. Knapp (1989)
    Jean Genet
  4. Lorde (1977)
    The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action
  5. Manalasan (2005)
    Race, Violence, and Neoliberal Spatial Politics in the Global City
    Social Text  ↗
  6. Marinara et al. (2009)
    Cruising Composition Texts: Negotiating Sexual Difference in First-Year Readers
    College Composition and Communication
  7. Proulx (2009)
    Connections from Kafka: Exposure to Meaning Threats Improves Implicit Learning of an Arti…
    Psychological Science  ↗
  8. Snyder (2007)
    Crises of Masculinity: Homosocial Desire and Homosexual Panic in the Critical Cold War Na…
    Critique
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