Student Work Interpreting or Responding to Queer Class Materials
In response to the queered lessons, students completed work that was related to the general topic of the lessons and sometimes the queer materials themselves. In responding to Sonnet 18, I asked students to consider whom the poet was speaking to in the poem, a question that provided a check for understanding, but also revealed how students reacted to the ambiguous reading of the poem I directed in class.
In regards to Bayard Rustin, students had to complete an essay question related to Rustin’s legacy as a Civil Rights activist. In student responses, I was most interested in seeing if and how students integrated information about Rustin’s sexuality to their argument that he deserved to be recognized for his work in the Civil Rights Movement. Having accounted for the fact that many of my students are progressing as writers, they still struggled significantly with understanding how Rustin’s sexuality related to the overall argument. In many cases, students were distracted by his identity as a gay man. In other situations, students revealed some of their overall beliefs about queerness through the ways they wrote about Rustin’s identity, whether it was that his sexuality was a deficit, they thought that a person’s sexual identity shouldn’t matter, or they supported Rustin and were frustrated by the way he was treated.