‘Sexing the subject’: evoking ‘sex’ in teaching an undergraduate course about sexuality

Abstract

This paper seeks to explore the relation between sexuality and pedagogy. This theoretical concern is examined with reference to two key pedagogical moments during a first‐year undergraduate course about schooling and sexuality. Through critical reflection of these episodes it is argued that when sexuality is the intellectual focus of a course, the pedagogical scene becomes inescapably ‘sexual’. While existing research analyses desire between teacher and student as a potential element of the pedagogical scene, this paper investigates how sexuality might manifest more generally and offer a pedagogical resource in educational encounters. The possibility of a sexual and embodied pedagogy that explicitly invites students to be sexual subjects in a space that traditionally prioritises mind over body is considered. How teacher and student subjects are invoked and to what ends this might be pedagogically productive are also investigated.

Keywords:

• sexuality
• pedagogy
• student
• teacher
• sex