New MALAS Spring 2020 Course Description! Lesbian Lives with Professor Jess Whatcott

Lesbian Lives and Cultures

Jess Whatcott, Assistant Professor, Department of Women's Studies, SDSU

Lesbian Lives and Cultures explores the identities, politics, and communities that women and gender non-conforming people have developed in relation to deviant sexuality. What was the political and cultural significance of identifying as a lesbian in the 20th century United States? What were the specific contributions of black, working class, disabled, and trans women in creating lesbian identity and community? How did both supportive experiences within lesbian community, and experiences of exclusion from lesbianism, inform other political and cultural identities, including queer and trans? In preparation for the Women's Studies department 50th Anniversary, this class will also work on a project to imagine the future of feminist approaches to queer studies.

Jess Whatcott, Assistant Professor, Department of Women's Studies, SDSU

Office: AL 334 Phone: 619-594-2861
E-mail: jwhatcott@sdsu.edu
Academia  | Curriculum Vitae (.pdf)

Dr. Jess Whatcott (they/them/theirs) is an interdisciplinary scholar who examines the intersecting histories of gender, sexuality, race, and disability in the United States. A first-generation student graduate of the California State University System (Humboldt State University, BA 2004, MA 2011), Dr. Whatcott taught in the CSU system prior to coming to San Diego State University. Dr. Whatcott received a PhD in Politics, with emphases in Feminist Studies and Critical Race & Ethnic Studies from University of California Santa Cruz. 

Their research examines the routes by which the discourses of eugenics attached difference to bodies, established an infrastructure of containment, and altered the political economy in early twentieth century California. Drawing on several fields including queer theory, crip theory, political theory, American political development, and critical prison studies, Dr. Whatcott tracks eugenics discourse in public policy, public law, social movements, political economy, scientific knowledge production, and popular culture. Dr. Whatcott’s recent article “No Selves to Consent: Women’s Prisons, Sterilization, and the Biopolitics of Informed Consent,” explores the legacies of eugenics that linger into the twenty-first century in women’s prisons (Signs: A Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 2018, vol. 44, no. 1). Integrating a diverse archive of public policy documents, social movement materials, and speculative fiction, Dr. Whatcott argues that informed consent is another tool by which the state continues to enact eugenics discourse and practice. 

Dr. Whatcott’s research, teaching, and community practice are rooted in over 15 years of organizing for prison abolition, transformative justice, and ending sexualized violence. More recently they have made efforts to follow the leadership of sick/disabled/mad queers toward creating disability justice.