Its the year 1990, you’re at the University of California, Santa Cruz standing within the thick blend of hazy mist, and the pungent aroma of the local ganja stand on the corner. You’re about to attend another usual seminar by, Teresa de Lauretis, an Italian-born author and doctor. During this seminar she’ll be focusing on one of her numerous capacities of concentration, queer studies and the phrase “Queer theory”. Yet, little do you know that the seminar you’re attending will be the unintended catalyst that will be re-open the questions relating between sexuality and gender, and the phrase “Queer Theory”.
Queer Theory plays on how we shouldn’t be categorized by neither our masculinity nor femininity, as well as challenging the general paradigm
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The one person I’ll be focusing on in this essay is Dr. David M. Halperin a professor at the University of Michigan, and a graduate of Classics and Humanities from Stanford University. In the article titled The Normalation of Queer Theory, Halperin fulfills his purpose of enlightening the readers concerning change in perception regarding the phrase Queer theory, as well as the transformation in implication of sole word queer. He begins by elaborating on Teresa de Lauretis, and her inadvertent affect catalyzed by her conference. The terminology used for that conference got her in quick sand amongst the faculty at UCSD, “Why do they have to call it that?”(339). Lauretis initiated the crowd immediately by acknowledging her provocation; she constructs clarity by saying she solely wanted to “unsettle the complacency of lesbian and gay studies”(340). She anticipated to construct queer theory as a “placeholder for a hypothetical knowledge-practice not yet existence”(340). Numerous characteristics and factors play into an individual's distinctiveness, it is offensive to place a threshold on an individual, or mold labels for individuals. Instead, queer theory enlarges the debate on distinct uniqueness, …show more content…
Halperin organizes his article by explaining the scandalous formula, which made the term queer theory a sort of “Advanced, postmodern identity, […] that superseded both feminism and lesbian/gay studies” (340). He resumes to illuminate the approval of the queer theory midst the colleges and the new fundamental politics resulting from its “anti-assimilationist” viewpoint. The individuals who developed feminism and lesbian/gay analyses, advanced the familiarization of queer theory into colleges, and were encouraged by the compulsion to convert what might amount to expertise, as well as through the willpower to alter the implementations of comprehension worked in the establishment of the university. In modern society, students who pursue the queer theory route don’t seek to transform the university, yet rather benefit what the university already has to offer. Not essentially being a bad thing, it is our fortune to live in a society and time period where queer learners can integrate the criticism of gender and sexuality into their professional lives, and live with their identities
In Chapter one of Queer America, the book breaks down confusion about certain terminology used with in the LGBT community. Vicki Eaklor proposes that Queer America resembles American history (ex: Civil Rights movement). She then goes on to discuss the dangers of homophobia and heterosexism; both create silence for the queer community. Furthermore, Eaklor goes on to discuss historical game changers in society, including former 16th president Abraham Lincoln. “Was Abraham Lincoln gay?” she suggests. Questioning the sexuality of historical figures in society is something she made sure to highlight, because it should not be assumed that all leaders are heterosexual, which is the “default” assumption. Unintentionally, I have found myself doing
Profane and shocking word choice helps drive Wittman’s confrontational and liberationist stance on LGBT+ issues. As authors Madeline Davis and Elizabeth Kennedy support in “Oral History and the Study of Sexuality in the Lesbian Community,” American queer rights movements became more critical and liberationist in the 70s (426). Wittman’s piece provides clear evidence of this tone change. By describing topics such as “exclusive heterosexuality” and interactions between males and females as “fucked up,” Wittman unabashedly confronts heteronormative culture and endorses queer peoples’ liberation from
This approach to queer subtext has been has always been a part of Western media as we as we explored in the film “The Celluloid Closet” (1995). Queer representation for many years was an continuous uncategorized personification that was vaguely acknowledged but to those who understood the subtext, it became an undercurrent of complex coded information that eventually paved the way for the integration of queer identification within the hetero film storylines. Doty speaks about this and also mentions that at some point in time representation of queer culture and sexuality
LGBT history has changed the way society works in the United States and has had an impact around the world. The homosexual community came as an impact to the world during the early 1900’s. They were considered different; odd, ill, and weak, but little did we know the effects it would have in today’s society and politics. The war, queer, and AIDs movements seem to relatively impact members of the gay and lesbian community the most. In an series of interviews in “Word is Out” conducted by Nancy Adair and Casey Adair, the reader is introduced into the lives of Pam, Rusty, and Pat; lesbian women living within their true identity during the mid-1900’s. Their stories consist of broken family relationships, marriage failure, and gender roles. To help one understand the dynamics of their relationships and lives, John D’Emilo talks about the effects of war and how it structures and damages the gay community and their opportunity for equality. Elizabeth Davis speaks about the Lesbian experience in public spaces that exposes many to find their character by associating with those that fit best to their community in “Lesbian Bar Culture in the 1930’s and 1940’s”. The LGBT community for centuries has won the spotlight in the news and many articles published in well know newspapers, but what many never get to hear or see are the struggle that many homosexuals face. Both gays and lesbians in the United States have received backlash because of their race, gender, and social class. The
He argues that psychologists as early as Freud have determined the importance of a person’s sexual identity in defining a person’s psychological make-up and then points out that it is impossible for a reader to divorce their sexuality from a reading of any text, that a reader brings to a text the entirety of his experiences and identity and therefore, he brings his sexual identity to the reading of a text also. I use the male pronoun at this point in this paper because the author of the article examined the homosexual male reader, which is separate from either the heterosexual identity and also separate from a lesbian identity because "the homosexual male, in spite of his ‘difference’ is still a biological man, and very importantly, he is a socially constructed man, with all that this implies for phallocentrism and patriarchy" (73). Therefore, it can be seen, a reader can neither divorce their sexual identity nor their gender identity from a reading of a text; in fact, because these factors play a major role in a reader’s psychological make-up, they also play a major role in a
The following thesis will lay out the progression in the LGBTQIA movement along with the deficits that these individuals have encountered throughout history. An interdisciplinary perspective through historical,
Faderman takes a decidedly social-constructionist analysis as she examines lesbian life in Twentieth Century America, arguing from the start that its definition has less to do with innate same-sex attraction than with external sociopolitical influences. It is apparent that in the debate between the “essentialist lesbians” and “existentially lesbians” she offers no apologies (and plenty of reasons) in siding with the latter. Not only does she explore how the sub-culture continually responds to external pressures such as conservative politics and institutional biases but deeply analyzes how then the community expands and contracts to its marginalization and oppression. For instance, she describes numerous times (such as the butch/femme role enactment and the demand for a regulated sexual intercourse between women in the 1970’s) when the lesbian community – and corresponding social movement – enacts various border patrolling and internal policing to maintain its strict identity as women to keep the pressure and agents of the patriarchy outside.
For every Black man that is born, each is gifted with the rigid expectations of being a hyper-masculine male. These expectations seemed to be passed down through generations from family members. The study "African American Gay Youth and Their Families: Redefining Masculinity, Coping with Racism and Homophobia.”, portrays some of the hardships of coming out within this specific community. A mother who was interviewed in this study said “You are told to be a man … and being a man does not mean you sleep with other men,” she said. “Being a man means you have a woman and you procreate and continue the family name.” And for queer black men especially, this expectation of needing a woman to be the validation for your manhood takes a toll on them and their ability to feel safe in coming out. In this essay I intend to outline the problematic expectations and stigmatization of the black queer male community and develop ways in which this problem can start to be overcome while dealing with different sections of intersectionality.
America has a long and complicated history, some of which has been forgotten or almost hidden away until recently, specifically LGBT history. The history of LGBTQIA+ people as a whole is something that has only been written about since the 1970s. Considering the fact that queer people have been around for much longer than that, their history is still not as developed as it should be. Michael Bronski, a cultural critic, independent scholar, progressive activist, and college professor, has been writing extensively on LGBT issues for four decades and has accumulated his knowledge into A Queer History of the United States. Publishing this “queer history”, his goal is to educated those who are willing to listen on the buried and forgotten LGBTQIA+
Queer theory could potentially offer the most qualitative of methodologies for collecting and analysing data. As it questions, even defies, the notions of objectivity and the essentiality of fact, queer theory opens more “texts” for study, and more bodies of knowledge to compile, compare, and evaluate.2
In Foucault and Queer Theory Spargo defines queer theory as a nebulous group of cultural criticism and analysis of social power structures relating to sexuality . It is these power structures and aspects of culture that are responsible for the discourse that creates and informs ones understanding of gender, race, and sexuality. However these aspects of identity do not exist separately from one another, but are constructed in tandem throughout history. These layers of identity inform each other in a way that is difficult if not impossible to separate. They do not act independently with an additive effect but intersect constructing their own unique set of experiences and perspectives. In this paper I will be exploring queer theory
The heterosexual imaginary is immensely ingrained in our everyday experience that most people, including feminist sociologists, has become inclined to conceptualize and theorize based around the heteronormative. The heterosexual imaginary acts as an invisible framework at play that structures our thinking processes and in which constructs our social identity. For instance, the inquiry of a survey taker’s marital status in most social science surveys come to show that our recognized and appropriate social identity is formed around heterosexuality. That is, any deviation from this heterosexual norm would be considered abnormal and be marginalized. To a minimal extent, this focus has served the interests of women because of the lack of activism
Canaday, M. (2014). LGBT history. Frontiers: A Journal of Women's Studies, 35(1), 11+. Retrieved from http://go.galegroup.com.proxy.davenport.edu/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA370396593&v=2.1&u=lom_davenportc&it=r&p=AONE&sw=w&asid=9d707445b93f162c44834c8c255b5954
As being developed by poststructuralism, feminism, lesbian & gay studies and even American pragmatist theory (Parker,2001; Seidman,1997), queer theory has become one of the most important theories, which contributes to the research of sociology, arts and organizations. On the one hand, queer theory has been used to study the relations between the sexuality, gender and workplace. On the other hand, by utilizing denaturalized, deconstructive and performative methods to queer the presumptions of the taken-for-granted norms, queer theorists question and disprove the traditions which people cherish (Seidman,1995).
This book features a collection of Judith Butler’s essays and her primary intention with this collection is to “focus on the question of what it might mean to undo restrictive normative conceptions of sexual and gendered life” (12). These essays look at the construction of gender and the way certain conceptions of it are normalized and reproduced in potentially harmful and limiting ways. Butler uses a feminist poststructural framework to critique the normalizing/marginalizing views of gender that exist because the “terms that make up one’s own gender are, from the start, out-side oneself, beyond oneself in a sociality that has no single author (and that radically