Presented by Social Justice Education
Colloquium: Alan Sears on Eros and Alienation: Capitalism and the Making of Gendered Sexualities
On Friday, April 17th, join the Department of Social Justice Education for a colloquium featuring Dr. Alan Sears, Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Toronto Metropolitan University, on his recently published book Eros and Alienation: Capitalism and the Making of Gendered Sexualities (Pluto Press, January 2025).
Our deeply human drive to shape the world and fulfill ourselves through labour is subverted by capitalist alienation, leaving us to seek fulfillment elsewhere. Dr. Sears examines how erotic drives become central to life-making yet are constrained by the demands of monetized or socially reproductive labour. This tension generates resistance, as life-making activity cannot be fully separated from the labouring self.
Eros and Alienation explores the relationship between alienated labor and sexuality, showing how the organization of work shapes dominant regimes of gendered sexualities, structured along binary categories of heterosexuality, homosexuality, and bisexuality. Dr. Sears draws on decades of activist and scholarly engagement with queer Marxism to illuminate how economic structures intersect with gender and sexual formation.
Date and time: Friday, April 17, 2026, from 3 – 5 PM
Hybrid location: OISE Room 12-199 and Zoom.
Refreshments will be provided to in-person attendees. Zoom link will be sent to all attendees.
Register here to secure your spot!
Please contact tatjana.grabeljsek@utoronto.ca if you have any questions.
This event is part of the Social Justice Education 2026 Colloquium Series, featuring talks from respected scholars.
About the Speaker
Alan Sears
Dr. Alan Sears is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Toronto Metropolitan University. He has been writing about queer Marxism for activist and scholarly audiences for over forty years and is an activist and author of several books, including Eros and Alienation: Capitalism and the Making of Gendered Sexualities (2025), The Next New Left: A History of the Future (2014) and Retooling the Mind Factory: Education in a Lean State (2003).
Dr. Sears’s research and teaching focus on sexuality, theory, social movements, work, and education, with a longstanding interest in social change, inequality, and civic engagement. He has taught all levels from grade two through graduate school and continues to connect scholarly work to activist engagements in movements for social justice. His current research explores sexual liberation beyond equality rights.
