This seminar explores the intersections between race, sexuality, and violence in the making of Western modernity. Historical in scope, students will develop a broad theoretical understanding of how race, sexuality, and violence shape and construct one another and operate as systems of power. We will draw on other disciplines—from art history to literary analysis—in order to explore the ways in which race, sexuality, and violence have operated to create social hierarchies, construct normative categories, maintain relations of power, and shape individual identities at different historical moments. We will also consider the challenges of doing historical research on these topics, with particular attention to the silences that available sources do not address, and possibilities for overcoming them.