Feb 10, 2007 3:56 pm US/Mountain
Group Says CU Gay Lit. Course 'Dishonorable'
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BOULDER, Colo. (AP) ―
A self-proclaimed conservative group targeting college liberalism is assailing a University of Colorado course that examines gay and lesbian literature.
The Young America's Foundation, based outside Washington, DC, gives the CU course "Introduction to Lesbian, Bisexual and Gay Literature," a "dishonorable mention" in a study titled "The Dirty Dozen: America's Most Bizarre and Politically Correct College Courses."
While it didn't make the top 12, the foundation includes the CU course among eight others just missing the cut.
The foundation claims the country's college students should be studying weightier subjects than gay literature or other courses it is targeting, including electives studying the male genitals, adultery novels, American Indian feminism and nonviolent responses to terrorism.
Foundation spokesman Jason Mattera said the courses edge out traditional scholarship and waste money and time. A recent poll, he said, finds Americans are more likely to identify the characters on the television cartoon The Simpsons than rights included in the First Amendment.
"There are a lot of soft courses," Mattera said. "Classes in American history go by the wayside."
The CU course on the Foundation's hit list includes poetry by Walt Whitman, who some say was gay, as well as works of novelist Virginia Woolf, who had an affair with a woman. The syllabus also includes films such as the gay cowboy tale "Brokeback Mountain."
Instructor Jesse Stommel said he's proud of his course's inclusion on the list and says he isn't trying to influence any students to think in any one particular way. Students say there is a wide diversity of philosophies and ideologies in the class of about 35 students.
There is also a waiting list of students eager to take the course.
On its Web site, the Foundation says, "The nation's campuses continue to be staffed and controlled by leftist radicals who seek a monopoly on what is said and thought."
Topping the Dirty Dozen list, Occidental College's course "The Phallus;" The University of California-Los Angeles' "Queer Musicology;" Amherst College's "Taking Marx Seriously: Should Marx be given another chance?" the University of Pennsylvania's "Adultery Novel;" and Occidental College's course "Blackness."
(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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