LGBTQ+ Studies at Hofstra University focus on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, their history, and culture. LGBTQ+ Studies examine sexualities and genders as identities, social statuses, categories of knowledge, and as lenses that help us frame how we understand our world. A minor in LGBTQ+ Studies is available to students in any major through Hofstra College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
LGBTQ+ Studies will benefit students who plan to go on to graduate school to earn advanced degrees in business, counseling, education, law, psychology, or the humanities.
LGBTQ+ Studies is an interdisciplinary program that features a University-wide network of faculty mentors and a winter study abroad opportunity in Paris, France.
Hofstra professors from various fields teach in the LGBTQ+ Studies program, including literature (Classics, French, English, Spanish), rhetorical studies, media studies, education, and religion studies. The inherently interdisciplinary nature of LGBTQ+ Studies is thus well served by the different domains of study and their methodologies.
Faculty and staff mentors make themselves available for consultation and advising, especially as the LGBTQ+ Studies program offers the possibility of quasi self-fashioned courses with the cooperation of professors who are inclined to do so. Interested students often find it helpful to consult with a mentor to help them pattern a course or series of courses that respond to their personal interests.
About the Program
Mission Statement
The LGBTQ+ Studies program at Hofstra University investigates the broad spectrum of sexual and gender identities from serious scholarly perspectives, including but not restricted to biology, classical studies, communications, cultural studies, fine arts, health sciences, history, literature, philosophy, psychology, and sociology. The program is interdisciplinary and designed to offer students various viewpoints from which to examine diversity – diversity of culture, but also diversity in families, communities, histories, institutions, languages and literatures, economics, and politics, as well as the complex social and cultural relations between marginalized sexualities and the heterosexual majority. Gender, sexual identities, discourses, and institutions are studied as they intersect with class, race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, and transnational movements.
Goals and Learning Objectives
Outcome Assessment Tools
The LGBTQ+ Studies program uses various methods to assess the performance of students and thereby instructors and the curriculum. These methods include but are not limited to periodic exams, final exams, written assignments, term papers, research papers, creative writing projects, and class presentations.
The faculty regularly assesses the effectiveness of these goals through a cyclical examination of one or more components of the program. After careful consideration of the findings of this examination, adjustments are made to the appropriate sector of the program, if needed.
Learning Goals
Learning Goal #1: Students will demonstrate knowledge of social, economic, political, intellectual, and cultural contributions of LGBTQ+ people of the past and present.
Objectives:
- Describe the social, economic, political, intellectua,l or cultural contributions of one or more LGBTQ+ person.
- Analyze scholarship, literature, art, music, dance, theater, or film created or performed by one or more LGBTQ+ person.
Learning Goal #2: Students will develop an understanding of how sexual identity and gender identity combine with nationality, race and ethnicity, religion, social class, and physical ability to shape the experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals.
Objectives:
- Evaluate scholarship on LGBTQ+ intersectionality.
- Describe the similarities and differences among LGBTQ+ people in different cultural and historical contexts.
Learning Goal #3: Students will acquire a basic understanding of LGBTQ+ history and queer theory.
Objectives:
- Summarize major developments in LGBTQ+ history since the 19th century.
- Appraise the thought and scholarship of one or more queer theorists.
Learning Goal #4: Students will engage in interdisciplinary approaches to LGBTQ+ Studies.
Objectives:
- Evaluate inter- or multidisciplinary scholarship on LGBTQ+ topics.
- Employ at least two different disciplinary perspectives in a paper, oral presentation, or research project on an LGBTQ+ topic.
Mentors
| Anastasio, Maria | Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures Room 310A Calkins Hall | 516-463-5504 | |
| Anderson, William C. | Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Teaching and Learning, Associate Dean for External Relations and Field Placement, School of Education Co-Director, LOTE/TESOL | ||
| Bley, Esther | Adjunct Instructor of Library Services | ||
| Bosley, Alicia | Associate Professor of Counseling and Mental Health Professions | 516-463-8101 | |
| Boyle, Annmarie | Assistant Professor; Dept. of Library Services | 516-463-6529 | |
| Buatti-Ramos, Sandra | Senior Associate Director of Career Development | 516-463-6786 | |
| Burlein, Ann | Professor of Religion | 516-463-7238 | |
| Collins, Den | Senior Supervisor, Music Monroe Lecture Center 014 | ||
| Costa, Riccardo | Adjunct Assistant Professor, Romance Language Department | ||
| Distefano, Rocco | MD/PhD, PhD, MD/MS Program Manager Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research Zucker School of Medicine | Email | 516-562-3832 516-463-7568 |
| Dresner, Lisa M. | Associate Professor of Writing Studies and Rhetoric Director, LGBTQ+ Studies Program | 516-463-0075 | |
| Ferraino, Mich | Associate Director of External Relations | 516-463-5833 | |
| Forman, Andrew | Director, MBA Co-op Program, Associate Professor of Marketing Guthart Hall #333 | 516-463-5331 | |
| Giaimo, Genie | Director, Hofstra Writing Center and Associate Professor of Writing Studies and Rhetoric 121 Mason Hall | ||
| Goodman, Debra | Professor of Specialized Programs in Education | 516-463-5563 | |
| Kaufman, Judith | Professor of Teaching, Learning, and Technology Room 128 Hagedorn Hall | 516-463-6566 | |
| Lawrence, Stephen S. | Professor of Physics and Astronomy | 516-463-5584 | |
| Lledo-Guillem, Vicente | Professor, Department of Romance Languages and Literature (Spanish) | 516-463-4623 | |
| Maziarka, Kristen | Assistant Professor of Criminology in the Department of Sociology | 516-463-5644 | |
| McCleskey, Sarah | Vice Dean for Administrative and User Services | 516-463-5076 | |
| McIntosh, Tyreek | Resident Director of Colonial Square | 516-463-2342 | |
| Merrill, Lisa | Professor of Speech Communication, Rhetoric, and Performance Studies | 516-463-5515 | |
| Monticciolo, Lisa | Dean of Students and Diversity and Inclusion Officer, Law School | 516-463-4809 | |
| Niedt, Christopher | Professor of Applied Social Research | 516-463-4073 | |
| Ostheimer, Gretchen | Professor of Computer Science | 516-463-6106 | |
| Salter, Nicholas | Associate Professor of Industrial-Organizational Psychology | 516-463-6349 | |
| Sampedro, Benita | Professor, Dept. of Romance Languages and Literatures and Latin American and Caribbean Studies Program Room 321 Calkins Hall | 516-463-4521 | |
| Seger, Kirwin | Resident Director of Constitution Hall | 516-463-7990 | |
| Smith, Russ | Director of First-Generation Support and Engagement Student Center 221A | 516-463-6931 | |
White, Lisa M. | Visiting Assistant Professor of Legal Writing Law School 0210 | 516-463-4994 | |
Yanega, Laura M. | Career Coach, Career Center | 516-463-7597 |
Symposia and Conferences
Click on the title of each event for more information.
- “Deviant” Pasts, Subversive Futures?
Thursday, April 23, 2020 - Michel Foucalt 2014: Beyond Sexuality
Thursday and Friday, March 27-28, 2014 - Queer Rhetoric: The 6th Annual LGBTQ+ Studies Conference
Friday and Saturday, March 16 and 17, 2012 - Sexual Identity: They Ain't What They Used to Be
4th Annual LGBTQ+ Symposium
Friday and Saturday, March 5-6, 2010 - Queer Iconography
Friday and Saturday, November 7-8, 2008 - Queer Exoticism
Thursday and Friday, October 11-12, 2007 - What Does Gay Mean Today?
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Past, Present, and Future
For more information about Hofstra’s LGBTQ+ Studies Program’s past, present, and future, check out the 12/17/24 episode of the WRHU podcast Queerly Informed, in which reporter Camryn Bowden interviews Dr. Bernard J. Firestone, former Dean of Hofstra College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, about the founding of the LGBTQ+ Studies Program and interviews Dr. Lisa M. Dresner, current Director of the LGBTQ+ Studies Program, about the program’s present and future.
Dr. Firestone’s discussion of the founding of the program runs from 0:00-9:21.
Dr. Dresner’s discussion of the program’s current and future projects runs from 9:22-28:56.