Online History Course: Beyond the Gender Binary

For 50+ years, feminist and trans, nonbinary, and genderqueer thinkers have unsettled one of the foundational beliefs of modern mainstream Western culture: that there exist two sexes, whose physical and psychological characteristics are obvious, knowable, and inherent in the body each person is born with.

In this course, JWA asks: How was the prevailing gender binary constructed? How does it change our understanding of history to bring a Jewish, queer, and trans lens to historical sources? And how can archives expand the current conversation about gender and Judaism?

Co-sponsored by Keshet.

Upcoming Dates:

Thursday, June 8, 8 PM ET: Confronting the Gender Binary

What is the gender binary? What does it mean to challenge/transcend/ignore it? How can archives and archival work expand our thinking on this? Tobaron Waxman (they/them) is an artist/curator who combines Jewish concepts and liturgy with "transsexual knowledge." Their artworks have been exhibited to critical acclaim, including The Jewish Museum Audience Award for their performance installation Opshernish. Since 2017, Tobaron has developed the Trans Collections at The ArQuives, the largest independent 2SLGBTQ+ archive in the world.

Thursday, June 15, 8 PM ET: Destabilizing the Gender Binary

What assumptions do we make when we talk about the gender binary, whether in preserving it or going beyond it? What is the Jewish history of the gender binary in America? Sarah Imhoff (she/her) is Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein Chair in Jewish Studies and Associate Professor in the Department of Religious Studies and the Borns Jewish Studies Program at Indiana University. She is author of Masculinity and the Making of American Judaism (2017) and The Lives of Jessie Sampter: Queer, Disabled, Zionist (2022).

Thursday, June 22, 8 PM ET: The Future of the Nonbinary Past

How are nonbinary and trans Jews today claiming space in Jewish history and theology? What is the future of the field? Max Strassfeld (he/they) is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Arizona. They are the author of Trans Talmud: Androgynes and Eunuchs in Rabbinic Literature (2022).

Click here to register.