Your comprehension and enjoyment of the readings we explore in this class will improve with a solid grasp of the terms that scholars of sexuality frequently use. Furthermore, remembering terms and their definitions becomes much easier when you have worked with the concept in more than one context and applied it to real life.

Guidelines
Check the attachment, you’ll be choosing at least one concept from each week for a total of 10 items!

Your annotations will come from your course readings this semester and your own experiences. Your glossary should be very thorough, organized and neat—something you will keep forever.

• Key concept: definition. Give the definition of this concept in the context of sexuality studies. Cite any sources. If you use external sources – meaning sources that have not been given to you in the course — you must list them on a Reference Page as well as citing them in-text. (1 mark)
• Example of that key concept used in a reading: quote from a course reading that uses this concept. Use an APA in-text citation to indicate which reading the quotation is from. (1 mark)
• Explanation: explain the quotation. How is the quote an example of the concept? Why and how does the author use this concept in the reading? (1 mark)
• Reflection: Use this concept in a sentence (or more). In this sentence, apply it to a real-world situation or to your life. (1 mark)

Sample Glossary Entry

Bisexual: A person whose attractions & intimate relationships may be with persons of any sex. Some individuals prefer the term pansexual because it acknowledges that there are more than two sexes and genders (Positive Definitions Exercise, Module 1 in Sexual Diversity Studies course).

Example in reading: “This emerging movement politicizes the so-called middle ground: Bisexuality invalidates either/or formulation, either/or analysis. Bisexuality means I am free and I am as likely to want and to love a woman as I am likely to want and to love a man, and what about that? Isn’t that what freedom implies?” (Jordan, 1991, 4th para from the end).

Explanation: June Jordan writes in this essay, A New Politics of Sexuality, about how the struggles of bisexuals can be analogous with those who are biracial – and that there is so much hope in how either requires learning how to embrace complexities and get beyond simple either/or analyses. She is talking about bisexuality as a stance, not just an identity.

Application: As someone who identifies as bisexual, I like to make little jokes about that. For instance, when I am asked if I would like chocolate or vanilla ice cream, I’ll often say something like, “Being bisexual, I’ll take some of each, please.”