Professors provide ‘Textual Healing’ at Sex Week panel
Sexuality and literature joined forces for Sex Week at the “Textual Healing” panel discussion on Tuesday evening. Associate Professors of English Lisi Schoenbach, Katy Chiles, Ben Lee and Urmila Seshagiri hosted the panel and brought with them the knowledge of their respective fields of study.
(From left to right) Dr. Katy Chiles, Dr.Urmila Seshagiri, Dr. Lisi Schoenbach and Dr. Ben Lee take questions from the audience at the "Textual Healing" panel discussion.
Taylor Owens/TNJN
Sexuality and literature joined forces for Sex Week at the “Textual Healing” panel discussion on Tuesday evening. Associate Professors of English Lisi Schoenbach, Katy Chiles, Ben Lee and Urmila Seshagiri hosted the panel and brought with them the knowledge of their respective fields of study.
“We are so excited to have been invited to do this and be part of Sex Week,” Schoenbach said. “We are so proud of the work you guys are doing and happy to be associated with it.”
Each of the professors discussed pieces of literature and read literary works as they described sex and sexuality.
Schoenbach and Seshagiri both specialize in 20th century literature, but discussed the differences in pieces from the time period.
Seshagiri read selections from “A Room of One’s Own” by Virginia Woolf and “The God of Small Things” by Arundhati Roy and noted the similarities in the themes although they were published 70 years apart.
“I taught both of these novels in the last week at the same time in my two different classes, and it struck me how much sex is itself a narrative concept,” Seshagiri said. “The sex act itself has a powerful narrative component.”
Lee teaches poetry and provided the audience with a handout of “Lana Turner has collapsed!” by Frank O’Hara, a gay male poet.
“It’s a more subtle, joyous representation of sexuality in poetry,” Lee said.
Chiles focused on African American literature and how black female sexuality written in the 1800s and more recently changes with the times. In particular, she talked about the first woman to publish a slave novel, Harriet Jacobs.
The panel discussion ended with questions from the audience. One member wanted to get a professor’s opinion on “Fifty Shades of Grey,” a modern novel about sexuality. None of the professors had read it, but they still had some wisdom to add.
“My guess is that there’s just something flat about the way it represents sex and sexuality,” said Lee. “And there’s something flat about its approach just to characters and narratives.”
Sex Week continues through Saturday. You can see a full schedule of events on their official website.
Edited by Jessica Carr
Arts and culture editor, Taylor Owens, recognized her passion for writing at a young age. As an avid talk show fan, Owens found journalism to be the perfect way to combine her love for interviewing and writing. She is now a sophomore at the University of Tennessee majoring in journalism and electronic media. When she isn’t writing for the Tennessee Journalist, Owens is most likely catching up on the latest reality television show.
