Odd Man Out

The course description for Dr. Linda Schlossberg’s Women, Gender, and Sexuality 1122: “The Romance: From Jane Austen to Chick Lit” promises “‘sensation,’ and titillation; the commodification of desire; Harlequins.” The reading list includes Jean Rhys and Charlotte Bronte, and like its syllabus, the class is dominated by women—about 40 of them. The exception is Joshua D. Smith ’08, the class’s lone male.

“I took a class with Linda Schlossberg in the summer,” says Smith, “and I was the only guy in a class of nine.” That wasn’t so bad, he says, but now, as one among forty, Smith says it’s “more overwhelming.”

But he’s not surprised. “Female characters, female writers—there’s a natural link,” he says. But just because he’s the only XY in the room doesn’t mean he can’t connect with the literature.

“I feel that my experiences aren’t all that different. With the course’s books, I don’t think it’s going to change my level of understanding,” Smith says. “It’s a different type of understanding.”

With all that understanding going on, one might think that an enterprising male might enroll in such a course where the odds are stacked in his favor.

When asked whether or not taking the course was a good tactic for picking up girls, Gena M. Haugen ’09 laughs, and then says, “I would definitely consider dating a guy who was interested in reading Jane Austen.”

But with enrollment numbers like those in WGS 1122, Haugen might have to widen her net.