A call for gay studies in higher ed.

David LaFontaine, professor in the English department at Massasoit Community College, offers up this important call to action in the Boston Globe recently.  LaFontaine served as chairman of the Governor’s Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth from 1992 to 2000.  Here are some highlights:

MASSACHUSETTS HAS a history of national leadership in the area of gay rights, but when it comes to the state’s public higher education system there has been virtual silence about including gay and lesbian studies in the curriculum. The creation of gay studies programs within the state’s 29 state and community colleges is long overdue.

The cultural revolution in attitudes toward homosexuality, generated in part by the explosion of gay characters on television and in films, has had a profound effect on today’s youth. What was once a hidden population on college campuses is now a visible and numerous presence. College curriculum, however, has failed to keep pace with the changed cultural landscape and with the needs of its gay population.

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Professors and their departments will need to lead the way in creating an inclusive college classroom in which the contributions of gay people are validated and studied. Subjects such as literature, history, and sociology are logical academic areas in which to incorporate gay topics. Literature courses will be enriched by studying gay themes in the work of authors such as William Shakespeare, E.M. Forster, Virginia Woolf, and Herman Melville. In addition to reinterpreting the classics, contemporary literature such as Annie Proulx’s “Brokeback Mountain’’ and Michael Cunningham’s “The Hours’’ merit inclusion within college classrooms.