Gender and Diversity course catalog published for the summer semester 2026

Nicole Dennis-Benn is a multi-award-winning author who was born in Jamaica in 1982 and moved to Brooklyn as a teenager. In her works, she explores her experiences as a Black, working-class, lesbian woman in both countries.
This is also the case in her second novel, Patsy, which is being read and analyzed for its postcolonial perspectives in a cultural studies seminar this semester.
The book tells the story of Patsy, a single mother from Jamaica who has to leave her daughter Tru behind in order to earn more money in the US for a secure future for both of them. There, Patsy is confronted with both structural problems, such as the expectations placed on her as a mother and undocumented immigrant, and personal problems, as she encounters a childhood friend for whom she develops feelings. Parallelly, Patsy recounts the development of Tru, who, as a gender-nonconforming, working-class, Black girl in Jamaica, also faces obstacles.
In the novel, Dennis-Benn explores the relationship between the two characters as well as a variety of socially critical issues such as anti-Black racism, xenophobia towards immigrants, gender roles, homophobia, classism, intra-family conflicts, the concept of the "American Dream," and much more.

If you now feel like reading the novel Patsy, or are generally interested in postcolonial studies and gender studies, don't miss the seminar Reflecting on Colonial Legacies: A Brief Survey of Colonial Literatures and Cultures. Similar topics are also covered in the seminar Race, Power, and Exclusion in the United States: A History of Racism.