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Non-Binary Rabbinic Pedagogy: Applying Talmudic Methodology in the Queer/Feminist Classroom

Mon, December 16, 3:30 to 5:00pm, Hilton Bayfront San Diego, Aqua Salon F

Abstract

As a student and educator of both queer theory and Jewish text, as well as a queer Jew myself, I am often faced with choices about how to engage honestly and productively with Jewish materials that might be invalidating to myself or other marginalized students, while maintaining an empowerment-based pedagogy in my classroom. Jose Esteban Muñoz’s theory of disidentification proves helpful when confronted with these challenges. Taking a queer lens to any text requires that we are willing, in Muñoz’s words, to recycle and rethink encoded meanings. Approaching the Talmud with this lens, I have discovered and extracted from the second perek of Pesachim a Talmudic method of analysis that I argue is itself already queer, or, more specifically, deeply non-binary. This method, which follows AnaLouise Keating’s invocation to use post-oppositional thinking as a mode of engagement that moves beyond binaristic and conflict-based thought projects, is particularly apt for implementation in the queer/feminist classroom.

In this paper, I offer a close analysis of the sugya (which is, in many respects rather typical) to show how its internal discourse privileges not the best argument against an opponent, but the best argument that can account for and harmonize all present positions. The Talmud strives to harmonize all sides of opposition with as little compromise as possible. This radical refusal to dismiss the opposition, instead repurposing and strengthening the opposition’s argument in order to arrive at more satisfying solutions, is important for the queer/feminist classroom, which always aims to integrate content and form. (That is, a field borne of a certain feminist political project is constantly grappling with how to resist not only through content, but also by way of innovative methodology.) When patriarchal and heterosexist discourses double-down, the rabbi’s non-binary method offers one way of resisting the temptation to always resist, instead implementing a practice of imagining new questions, conversations, and solutions. This paper will conclude with a short guided chevrusa activity.

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