Friday: Two Days Past the Workshop

I am still very pleased with how the workshop turned out. I think the four presenters each did very well, and each one of them raised a series of issues which, in and of itself, could have been the focus of a workshop or panel.

As was discussed near the end of the workshop, hopefully many if not all of the attendees and speakers will submit their own proposals next year for queer-themed workshops. Or lesbian themed. Or bisexual themed. Or sex and composition themed. Unless there are more people proposing, there will not be as many workshops. Similarly, it might be a good idea to network so that we have some idea of how many queer people are presenting, proposing, and getting rejected.

I did enjoy the less formal atmosphere, and I enjoyed the exchanges between all of the participants. It is in this kind of place and space where many of us have the chance to finally network with others who are like us. Or at least they are more like us than many of our colleagues.

Finally, a big thank you to Jon, Jackie, Michael, and Nels for showing up, participating, and presenting so many interesting ideas, and an equally powerful thanks to the attendees! Hopefully y'all will inundate the C's with your materials next year!

Reviewing Identity on Sissy Street

Currently, I am staying with friends on St. Anne's in the French Quarter. I was told that this is referred to as "Sissy Street." Normally, I would be offended by that, but since I am here--away from my normal place and space of comfort--I find it pretty funny. I also find it comforting.

More comforting is walking down a street and seeing the rainbow flags, knowing that there are five or six gay bars within a stones throw, and that most men living on this block are gay. That makes me feel comfortable and safe in a way that I have not felt before.

I have never lived in a "gay ghetto," nor have I sought them out. I have always avoided large cities like the plague, but cities are usually the only places which have said ghettos. So avoiding big cities means avoiding gay enclaves.

Being in a totally new place without my partner has been pushing me to rethink just what it is to be gay/queer/etc. This has little to do with theory. This has everything to do with the actual location of my body, how it feels emotionally, and how relaxed I am.

I can honestly and proudly say I really, really like being here. If I could afford to sanely live in a gay ghetto I would. While it may make me sound like a sheep or a conformist, I cannot deny what is true: I want to live around people like me: LGBT folks. The sense of safety, absence of fear, or deep location of normalcy is truly astonishing.

Who knows how I will feel tomorrow, but I sure feel good right now. I like knowing that many of the people around me are like me. After decades of feeling alienated, isolated, or hermitted--by choice--I now have a sense of how other folks live.

I also know there are serious issues of race and class that are not addressed here--that the world on the other side of Rampart is very different. I just got here. I have had less than five hours sleep today, and that was on a plane. My analytical skills are not as honed as they need to be to grapple with race and class. I just did not want to pretend as if they do not exist or as if I am ignoring them.

Identity

I'm working on my presentation now, and I remembered that I wanted to post an initial introduction over here. When I first applied to graduate school, I wrote a statement saying that I wanted to study identity. Yeah, I was rejected from most places. And it feels silly to title a post with identity and to say that I am going to be talking about the shifts and flows of our sexual and academic identities in my talk, but that is what I am going to do.

I am an Assistant Professor of Rhetoric and Professional Writing at the University of Hartford, where I am also Director of First-Year Reading and Writing. Next year, I will become Director of Gender Studies. I'm really excited about that one. I have an eclectic background: an MA in Women's Studies and an MA in Comparative Cultural Studies, both from Ohio State, and an PhD in English from the University of Illinois at Chicago. In my academic life, I have been all over the place and taken on various identities.

I have been out for the entirety of my adult life, sometimes wavering between identifying as queer and gay, which I will discuss in my talk. Right now, I'm pretty much living the privileged, middle-class life.

One of the things I want to spend some time talking about is the idea of shame and how that shapes who we are. I will borrow from Michael Warner on this. Perhaps I'll just post the notes for my talk this weekend?

At any rate, there's a little of who I am. Though my identities shift over time, I don't think much will change by next Wednesday!

what is a public

Gregory asked me to post this here, so I thought I would. It's from a comment on a previous post in which Gregory asked about publics:

Are you familiar with the work of Nancy Fraser? She discusses the word public and it's multiple meanings. Michael Warner, who also does queer theory, does as well.

Fraser has four definitions of public: 1) related to the state, 2) accessible to everyone, 3) concerning everyone, and 4) having to do with the common good. Warner has three definitions: 1) "a kind of social totality," 2) a concrete audience, like at a theatre or public speech, and 3) the kind of public that comes together in relation to a text.

Warner focuses on the last one in "Publics and Counterpublics." Latour, too, focuses on the notion of a public being created by a text, if I understand what I've been told about him correctly.

So, I think when we ask what kind of public we are addressing as public intellectuals, I'd say at least 4:
1. The classroom (a space that is both public and private)
2. Our colleagues/the discipline (through texts, such as our talk at 4C's, our blogs, and in journal articles)
3. The general public, if accessible, though perhaps that isn't possible except in the most watered down sense. I'm imagining articles for magazines, blogging, etc.
4. Counterpublics, or those publics that are set as alternatives to the mainstream (though our discipline is also a counterpublic, as Warner argues). I'm thinking here, though, of queer publics.

Arguably, though, a job of a public intellectual is not just to speak to publics, but to help foster public spaces so that others can speak. At least, that's my belief, especially after reading Christian Weissner's book Moving Beyond Academic Discourse and the work of Herbert Marcuse.

Documenting the Discussion

So we are thinking about recording the presentation which we give at the C's with audio and/or video, but we do not want to limit participation or make people feel uncomfortable--as if they are being surveilled. As such, the current plan is to video our opening statements comments and our replies to each other.

Does this seem like a reasonable approach--one that will not interfere with participation?

The Queer Lever

Here's an uncomfortable question: As LGBT/Queer folk, do we ever make use of our queer status nature in order to give us an edge for committees, publication, hiring, etc. That is, do we extract value from our "oppressed" status and get more mileage out of it than other folks?

An example. Many years ago, I worked for a company where the manager was queer. This meant that when there were problems, stress, etc., the hetero folks were usually on the firing line before the queer folks. This also meant that when queer folks messed up, in a minor situation, it was often overlooked; if it could not be overlooked, then you were made to pay more severely than others. My point: as a queer in this position, I had an easier time getting and keeping the job by virtue of being gay--that's it. But I was also held to higher standards and expected to enforce the homo-hegemony, as it were. [I want to note here that all of the queer folks, me included, at this job site were white--so I have no clue how race played into the situation.]

If we have the chance to do so in Academia, do we exploit such situations?

Such issues demonstrate to our peers, students, and bosses who and what we are. And I think it is important to consider some of the queer benefits/perks as much as the oppressions and problems.

What is Public?

When we talk about Said's notions--and our reflections and remixes of it--about public intellectuals, what do we mean by public?

Is the classroom enough?
Should we limit our speech and activism to the campus?
Are the borders of professional journals and publication far enough?
How about YouTube? Should we go there? Is it even far enough?

And when we go "public" with our intellectualism, what do we do with our language? Do we keep the Spivakisms, Babaisms, and Derridaisms which we may know but mean nothing to most people? Do we write at the 8th grade level so most of America can grok what we are saying? How much do we alter our voice for our audience?

When we work at being public intellectuals, it seems essential that we grasp exactly what we mean when we use the word public--and the implied audience--as well as what we mean by intellectual.

A Riff on Bodies: Gay Versus Adjunct

Warning: This is writing while thinking/reflecting on images of body...

When I'm in the classroom, I often feel like my discussion of being an adjunct--a part-timer--is more volatile or explosive than talking about being Gay. Also, I am not of the school of outing without reason. I'll out myself, but I won't be blatant--I also won't hide. But, honestly, it just does not come up that much. And if it does, it is brief. Being an adjunct is a different manner.

Being a part-timer directly impacts my pay, ease of access to students, resources, pay, etc. These are tangible elements with physical effects/impacts. And they impact my students more directly than my being gay. At least that's how I see it.

Strangely enough, I also think being a part-timer and being vocal about extraction part-time labor is much more threatening to administration than talking about lgbt/queer issues. Adjunct issues center on economics and exploitation directly, and many queer/lgbt issues do not deal directly with money. Power, yes; money, not as much.

This process is odd for me, but more and more I feel like I'm coming out as an adjunct and being mouthy--sort of--while my Gay identity is pretty content with who/what/where it is. Nobody has threatened my gay self or identity. My adjunct identity, however, stands under constant economic threat and surveillance.

Does this mean my adjunct body is now queer?

the dragged body: a follow up to "the queer body"

Shehun's post was cool. Thought I'd take a second and post an image or two myself. Text coming sometime soon, I hope. :)


(2006 OSU Fall Drag Show)


(Spring 2006)

the queer body

I'll post text soon. Promise.

C's Program Blurb

Here's the blurb from the C's program:

Session: MW.13 on Apr 2, 2008 from 9:00 AM to 12:30 PM	Cluster: n/a) Not Applicable
Type: Workshop: Wednesday Morning	Interest Emphasis: sexuality
Level Emphasis: all	Focus: not applicable
What's Queer Got To Do With It This queer-identified round-table engages and explores how being queer intellectuals impacts our professional identities, our performances as composition teachers, and our memberships in English departments. By examining our queer performances as discursive or theatrical, our intellectual work goals and agendas, and our status as exiles (or not), the panelists will actively encourage discussion among the audience and the panelists. This collective exploration is grounded in the intersections of queer theoretical perspectives on performance and Edward Said's discussions of the role of intellectuals. Edward Said states, “The intellectual's role is dialectically, oppositionally to uncover and elucidate the contest [between the powerful and the less powerful, who are subject to silence, frustration, assimilation, or extinction] ... to challenge and defeat both an imposed silence and the normalized quiet of unseen power wherever and whenever possible. For there is a social and intellectual equivalence between this mass of overbearing collective interests and the discourse used to justify, disguise, or mystify its workings while also preventing objects or challenges to it†(Humanism and Democratic Criticism 135). The goal of this panel is to engage in discourse which demystifies the workings of English and Composition as fields and departments. As queer compositionists, we will share, compare, and contrast our experiences, strategies, and insights in the struggle against exile and silence. Panel members will briefly introduce themselves and their locations within the queer, academic, and intellectual communities. Panelists will then describe, discuss, and/or question (for circa 10-20 minutes) what they see as a crucial nexus in the cultural interzone of intellectual, queer, professional, and compositional identities. This may include homophobia, heterosexism, mentoring, horizontal versus hierarchical information exchange, radicalism, the pragmatism of identity groups, and assimilation. After each of the four panel members presents and discusses their nexus of interest and concern, the panelists and the audience will discuss how these concerns are related and impact one another. The panel will consciously focus on identifying and bringing the intersections of Said’s vision of intellectuals and queer performance to the fore. Panel members will intentionally engage the audience to create a dialog about how being queer at these intersections impacts their professional lives. Struggling against silence and creating professional lives also raises issues of assimilation and collaboration with forces and groups who once sought to silence us. Is it possible for us to continue our intellectual and political work when we are no longer exiles? As Said indicates, “Even intellectuals who are lifelong members of a society can, in a manner of speaking, be divided into insiders and outsiders: those on the one hand who belong fully to the society as it is, who flourish in it without an overwhelming sense of dissonance or dissent, those who can be called yea-sayers; and on the other hand, the nay-sayers, the individuals at odds with their society and therefore outsiders and exiles so far as privileges, power, and honors are concerned. The pattern that sets the course for the intellectual as outsider is best exemplified by the condition of exile, the state of never being fully adjusted, always feeling outside the chatty, familiar world inhabited by natives, so to speak, tending to avoid and even dislike the trappings of accommodation and national well-being. Exile for the intellectual in this metaphysical sense is restlessness, movement, constantly being unsettled, and unsettling others. You cannot go back to some earlier and perhaps more stable condition of being at home; and, alas, you can never fully arrive, be at one with your new home or situation†(Representations of the Intellectual 52-3). Panel members will discuss if becoming full and accepted members of our field, of our departments, impacts our ability to be effective and engaged intellectuals. The audience and the panel will discuss if being queer exiles offers us an intellectual and professional edge that more than compensates for our outsider status. Within the discussion of exile or membership, the panelists will consider how queer performance moves us toward our individual intellectual, compositional, and pedagogical goals.

Welcome!

This is the blog for the "What's Queer Got To Do With It" presentation at the coming CCCC's in New Orleans.

The tentative plan for our presentation is listed below:

Apr 2, 2008 from 9:00 AM to 12:30 PM

Coffee Break at 1030

Pre-meeting in room if any recording, etc., needs to set up—get used to the room

Welcome: introduction to panel in General (gz)—5 min

Panel members introduce themselves & their location within queer, academic, & intellectual communities and present the (each panelist 5 minutes/per)—20 min

Time/Topic Breakdown:
9 am or so

5-10 mins Moderator – Introductions; Theoretical Context (Said & Queer Performance)
15 mins Nels self-intro & present critical nexus within queer, academic, & intellectual communities
15 mins Jackie Presents critical nexus etc
15 mins Michael Presents critical nexus etc

10 am or so

15 mins Jonathan Presents critical nexus etc

Summary/ Invite audience feedback (gz) 5 minutes

15 mins Audience Response/ Feedback/Discussion

1030 am

10-15 min break

10 minutes each per speaker to respond to an audience member’s point or what each other speaker said

Jonathan

Michael

11 am

Jackie

Nels

1130 or so
60 mins Exchange with audience

1230 DONE