The German Discovery of Sex (Spring 2011)

Course Number

GERM 230

Syllabus Date

Spring 2011

Faculty Member

Robert D. Tobin, Clark University

Department course is offered by

GERM - German

Course description

In this course, we will use the tools of literary and cultural analysis, studying fictional, political, psychoanalytic and scientific works to investigate the emergence of modern sexual discourses in the German-speaking world. The Greek term “homo” (same) and the Latinate “sex” (sex) were first combined to describe someone with a sexual interest in members of their own sex in 1869 in the German-speaking world. Similar observations can be made about terms such as “heterosexual,” “masochist,” and “transvestite.” There was apparently an intense interest in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century German-speaking central Europe in reconfiguring and reconsidering sexuality. Out of this interest emerged sexologists such as Richard von Krafft- Ebing, whose Psychopathia Sexualis introduced a new vocabulary of sexuality to the entire world, homosexual activists such as Karl Ulrichs, who made arguments about sexual rights that are still prevalent in the gay community today, and Sigmund Freud, whose understanding of sexuality arguably structured much of twentieth-century popular culture.

Keywords

psychology, Sigmund Freud, Germany, queer studies, sexuality, psychoanalysis

Recommended Citation

Tobin, Robert D., "The German Discovery of Sex (Spring 2011)" (2011). Syllabi. 9.
https://commons.clarku.edu/tobinsyllabi/9