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-- Courses that examine pornography can be risqué, but they are an increasingly common addition to university curriculums in the U.S.
"Many students appear to be shocked," said Ellis Hanson, a professor of English at Cornell.
"But I gather they don't mind being shocked."
Among other features, Hanson screens the porn classic Deep Throat and Paris Hilton's homemade sex tape for students in his course, "Desire."
"I would not want to have a discussion of pornography in the abstract," Hanson says.
"And it works very well with Plato on the syllabus."
Hanson assigns a range of written and visual items dealing with sexuality, including nude illustrations for Aristophanes' play Lysistrata and Oscar Wilde's play Salome and modern materials like Robert Mapplethorpe's photographs of men clad in leather.
When Hanson teaches The Balcony, a Jean Genet play with elements of fetishism and sado-masochism, he dresses the part. "Leather fetish gear seems more appropriate than the conventional jacket and tie or baggy sweater favored by most of my colleagues," he explains.
Hanson's course has an enrollment of about 200.
Not surprisingly, it's one of the most popular offerings in the English department. --
