Every Class this Week Was about Gender and Sexuality

Last Updated on September 29, 2023

I’m not sure if this was pure coincidence or not but all of my classes this week in some way, shape, or form revolved around gender and sexuality and I must say, I think everything tied together quite nicely.

Sociology:
Gender and Sexuality

Guest Lecture from a Sociology TA

On Tuesday, one of our Sociology TAs was a guest lecturer on the topic of Gender, Sex, and Sexuality. He was very knowledgable on the subject as he’s currently working on getting a Ph.D in Women and Gender Studies.

I had a little bit of trouble understanding what was being said because he happened to have a thick accent. Just to give an example that I thought was a little humorous: while discussing scientific evidence found in a controlled twin study, I thought he was saying “identical twinks” and I was like “is it really acceptable for us to be calling them that…” but then I realized he was saying twins

Training Rules: A Documentary on Rene Portland

In class today, we watched a documentary called Training Rules. It was all about homophobic Coach Portland from Penn State who mistreated her female basketball players. The whole movie discussed the awful things she said to her players. It concluded with “when contacted, Rene Portland refused to discuss these issues with us.” Haha well yeah, because what she did was awful!

Abnormal Psychology:
Sexual Dysfunctions, Paraphilic Disorders, and Gender Dysphoria

 

Abnormal Psychology this week has been all about sexual dysfunctions and disorders. I don’t have too much to say on this other than that I was surprised to see transvestic disorder and gender dysphoria listed in the DSM-5 as mental disorders…

Actually, I’m surprised by most of the stuff I read in this chapter… I think it’s all pretty controversial.

Creative Blogging:
The Blogger’s Identity

In Creative Blogging, we talked about how some bloggers chose not to disclose their identities. An example included people who blog anonymously because they are not comfortable being associated with the content they write about – as is the case with many LGBT bloggers. Likewise, some bloggers don’t want to “out” the people they’re writing about if personal issues are discussed on the blog so in that case, they won’t reveal their own identity. However, anonymity comes at a cost. Readers may find bloggers less trustworthy and harder to relate to.

While I understand the benefits of blogging anonymously, I prefer being up-front about who I am since it allows me to establish relationships with my readers. Just this past week alone, I’ve been fortunate enough to connect with two really awesome people who I never would have met had I not stated who I am.

General Biology:
Animal Behavior and Population Ecology

Our two lectures in Biology this week were super broad but we talked a little bit about couples, mating, monogamy, polygamy, and homosexuality in other species. Everything was skimmed over but hey, it was still mentioned!

General Chemistry:

Ok, I guess chemistry was the one class this week that didn’t relate. 😉

It’s all about having good chemistry.

7 Comments

  1. The issue of “gender dysphorias” is pretty controversial in Psychiatry and I really think they need a work group to reassess their wording and diagnoses. But anyway, we were taught that the reason the DSM still classifies transvestic “disorder” is essentially because it enables people to get hormone treatments or even gender reassignment surgery. Essentially, you need an ICD code for funding of medication or surgery, thus its inclusion in the DSM allows for that.

    1. I, too, think the wording could be reassessed so that it doesn’t contribute to the whole “abnormal” ideology for people who identify as trans and such. That’s actually an interesting reason – I hadn’t thought of it like that.

      Thanks for sharing your knowledge with me, BarefootMedStudent! 🙂

Comment Here:

The Rocky Safari