Sex in the Digital Age

Catalog description

This seminar examines sex and sexuality in the digital age, turning to the Internet, as well as other sites of digitally-mediated encounters, to better understand contemporary formations of intimacies. We will traverse digital sites, online communities, literature, popular culture media, and art to investigate dating and hookup apps, queer community formations, cruising, porn, OnlyFans, robots, AI, and speculative fiction, amongst others. Tracing both the lineages and trajectories of sex in the digital age, topics of conversation will range from feminist debates about the ethics of pornography in the 70s and 80s to the increasing prevalence of AI companionship and anxieties around technological futures. Our course will use critical scholarship, considering race, gender, and sexuality to interrogate politics of belonging, desirability, and intimacy in our increasingly digitized world. Limited to first-years and sophomores, no prerequisites.