{"id":3115,"date":"2015-04-28T03:01:52","date_gmt":"2015-04-28T03:01:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theaccent.org\/?p=3115"},"modified":"2015-04-28T03:01:52","modified_gmt":"2015-04-28T03:01:52","slug":"queer-writing-goes-mainstream-in-acc-curriculum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/queer-writing-goes-mainstream-in-acc-curriculum\/","title":{"rendered":"Queer Writing Goes Mainstream in ACC Curriculum"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Story by Stefanie Ventura, Reporter<\/p>\n

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ACC has welcomed queer writing into its honors program.<\/p>\n

This semester, for the first time, the college offered ENGL 1302 \u2013 Composition II \u201cQueer Writing: Stories By & About LGBTQ People.\u201d<\/p>\n

The course is designed to show the importance of fiction for the LGBTQ community as a political tool, historical reference and healing experience. The class also focuses on queer identity within society.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI am a self-identified queer woman who happens to be married to a man. It\u2019s confusing to some people. In fact, the word queer confuses a lot of people,\u201d<\/p>\n

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Professor Louisa Spaventa, who designed and teaches the class, said. \u201cMajor universities and institutions use that word as kind of umbrella term for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender. It\u2019s sometimes just used as a shortcut.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the LGBTQ community becomes more visible and a more prevalent part of our literacy, there is a high demand for literature that shares the experience of these diverse lives.<\/p>\n

Spaventa said the course is more of a collaborative learning experience, where everyone sits in a circle and participates. The main focus is on the discussions and identifying certain issues in the story.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s one of my favorite subjects,\u201d Christina O\u2019Donnell, president of the Gay-Straight Alliance club at ACC, said. \u201cI wanted a different kind of outlook, and I thought the topic would be really interesting and intriguing for me to read about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also enrolled in the class, Katya Marcelle Garcia said her biggest motivation was the new and different perspectives she\u2019s gained of her peers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI think it is very important for people to be able to relate to each other on different levels even if you haven\u2019t been through the same things,\u201d Garcia said. Acceptance by peers and society make up the majority of issues addressed in class.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome are just coming to terms with their gender and sex identity,\u201d professor Spaventa said. \u201cSome are just working on healing themselves from years of bigotry. They face violence \u2014 especially transgender women.\u201d<\/p>\n

Professor Spaventa explains that most of the discrimination trans students face happens out of sight.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of the violence happens in the restrooms because somebody notices somebody else is not like them and it can be nerve wrecking,\u201d Spaventa said.<\/p>\n

Class member David Oberparleiter was optimistic in his outlook for young members of the LGBTQ community.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know it\u2019s tough, it was tough for me. So I\u2019ll say just hang in there it gets better.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Story by Stefanie Ventura, Reporter ACC has welcomed queer writing into its honors program. This semester, for the first time, the college offered ENGL 1302 \u2013 Composition II \u201cQueer Writing: Stories By & About LGBTQ People.\u201d The course is designed to show the importance of fiction for the LGBTQ community as a political tool, historical […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4015,"featured_media":3234,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[54,100,485,565],"class_list":["post-3115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-accent-reporter","tag-austin-community-college","tag-queer-writing","tag-stefanie-ventura"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4015"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}