Freshman Composition: Representing Sexualities from Winterson to Whitman

Is Anyone Out There?

meganw — Fri, 15 Dec 2006 17:34:15 +0000

If any of you are still reading the blog, I think you should check out this new article at http://www.dallasvoice.com/artman/publish/article_4186.php. The whole thing is ridiculous, yet I feel it is the way the American society would have acted a few decades ago.

Whitman

jeff10 — Fri, 15 Dec 2006 03:10:26 +0000

So today’s class was most enjoyable while covering Whitman. I find it interesting what everyone thinks about something. There are always so many ways to look at something. Before this class, when I read I always took the most obvious thing from the reading or just read the story as though it was some form of entertainment. But now after taking this class I find myself re-reading something over an over trying to figure out what it means of if it has a deeper meaning. It definitely makes the readings more interesting, and it’s kind of fun just to put your own spin on the story through guessing what things mean. So today’s discussion about Whitman was most enlightening.

Last Class/Research Paper

hannah37 — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 21:29:36 +0000

So our last class is in 40 minutes and I’ve spent the last hour going through and reading blogs and realizing how much we’ve covered in the last 3 months. This has definitely been the most interesting class I’ve ever taken and surprisingly, it has opened my mind even more. I’m sad to see the class end On a lighter note, I’ve almost got my paper complete!! It has changed quite a bit since the first draft and it has been a really exciting process. I picked the topic because I thought I knew a lot about it, but through researching and writing the paper, I’ve become even more intrigued with the topic. I’m so glad I took this class because I would have probably never gotten the chance to write about this! All in all, I just wanted to say I love all of you and thank you Travis for deciding to do this class! Hope everyone has a great break and happy holidays!

God and Marriage

karenbarnett — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 06:01:53 +0000

I was doing research for my research paper. I am researching the similarities and differences between the African American Civil Rights Movement and the gay rights movement, specifically same-sex marriage. (This is in my paper, but I thought it would be interesting for everyone to read this). What I did not know was that interracial marriage was once seen as going against God’s plan. This is very similar to the reason why many people disagree with same-sex marriage. A Virginia judge said: “Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and He placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with His arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that He separated the races shows that He did not intend for the races to mix.”

Now we know that this is clearly wrong… Maybe in the future they will realize that “God’s plan” to deny marriage to same-sex couples is wrong as well.

Whitman

jeff10 — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 05:40:16 +0000

So I was extremely disappointed today when Travis said we wouldn’t have time in the rest of the semster to talk about Whitman and his very intriguing poetry. I was all ready to talk about Whitman and not the papers. So many of our other discussions were so in-depth. I just felt as though we scraped the top of Whitman. I don’t feel as though we got the full benefit from reading Whitman’s poems. Many of the poems offered up much ambiguity that could offer us incite into the period in which Whitman was writing. Were these his fantasies, experiences or stories? Its a shame more couldn’t be done. But oh well, I guess this adds to the mystery of it all.

Brokeback Mountain

jennyz — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 23:20:17 +0000

I just saw brokeback mountain for the first time this weekend and I thought it was really good. I didn’t think they would show as much as they did of the two guys, but I think it was a huge step for the gay community and their portrayal in the media. I just don’t get why if they loved each other so much why they couldn’t just be together instead of living double lives. Overall I thought the movie was really good.

Real World

lucassoderstrom — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 16:55:32 +0000

I also saw that episode of the real world, and found it very interesting. To recap, a white gay man in the house called on of his roomates, a black man, the n word. Just a few episodes before, one of the roomates told the gay roomate that he didn’t agree with homosexuality, and didn’t like the lifestyle. The gay roomate was taken back by this, and thought the other man was ignorant and unfair. That’s why it is so ridiculous that a few episodes later, he called a roomate the n-word. I suppose some of the blame can be attributed to alcohol consumption. However, it was a completely hypocrytical action, and it made his original point, about the acceptance of homosexuality, look worse.

Wedding Wars Critique!

jeff10 — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 04:20:38 +0000

Fabulous! So A&E’s Wedding Wars was probably as good as a made-for-TV-movie can get. It was more sensitive than I thought it would be. It also made civil unions out to be nothing at all like marriage. It said that civil unions didn’t allow for all the benefits that marriage did. I guess I was under the impression that civil unions were like marriage in that they granted all of the same rights as marriage. I think I’m sticking with what I thought at first; you can’t always trust everything you see on A&E, but I may be wrong. The movie had other subplots and on the whole was pretty good in how it dealt with gay issues. Of course, certain stereotypes couldn’t be avoided, such as the lesbians having hammers and rebuilding the gazebo. The brother of John’s character is McSteamy from Grey’s Anatomy. There were many other appealing people for homos and heteros alike! It’ll be shown again this Saturday at 9pm. It is a great show to wind down to after hours of studying for finals.

Wedding Wars

jeff10 — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 00:05:52 +0000

Wedding Wars is on tonight on the A&E station, channel 33. Its about a gay wedding planner (John Stamos)who plans his brothers wedding. Stamos’ character’s brother’s to be wife’s parents don’t agree with gay marriage or something. So Stamos’ character starts a gay strike. What would happen if all the gay people went on strike? No more florists, wedding planners, caterers, beauticians, and other stereotypical gay male professions. I’m sure this video will enforce all kinds of stereotypes, but will also be much like that of Will&Grace, to a certain extent. The Wedding War’s website has links to discussion boards and other information about gay marriage.

meganw — Sun, 10 Dec 2006 21:08:39 +0000

Last Wednesday, I attended a College Democrats Meetings where Senator Jon Erpenbach spoke about the Amendment. Erpenbach believes it is ludicrous for the Wisconsin congress make rules about marriage, half the representatives are divorced, including Erpenbach. And the leading proponent of the ban is on his third marriage! Erpenbach also stated his divorce did not result from a gay couple living down the street-it was because they did not get along, and treating gay civil unions as a threat to the sanctity of marriage is very backwards. Erpenbach has plans to pass another amendment to the Wisconsin Constitution which will ban discrimination because it is surprising not already there. He believes the two amendments would collide and therefore have to be taken to the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Even if the judges are conservative, they are much more likely to be level headed and declare the ban on gay marriage as illegal.