Hauras, korjaava ja parantumaton queer

Katse ylpeyden, normatiivisuuden ja (uus)häpeän aikoihin

Authors

• Leena-Maija Rossi University of Lapland

DOI: https://doi.org/10.23980/sqs.66351

Abstract

The article ponders queer as a temporal phenomenon and inquires the cultural and social repercussions of queer thinking, theorizing, and activism in the United States and Finland during the past quarter of a century. The examples highlight changes in the positions of gender and sexual minorities, including issues of visibility, rights, and recognition. In terms of queer theory, the article converses with Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick and Sara Ahmed in particular. Sedgwick figures in the text as a theoretician of both queer temporality and reparativeness (versus paranoid thinking), while Ahmed provides into discussion the notion of queer affectivity and the potential of queer fragility. The article also questions queer practices of exclusion and the defining of “proper” queer subjects and objects, as well as the positioning of the straight–gay opposition at the root of queer thinking and queer doing of gender and sexuality. After pride and homonormativity, after self-defined queers have reclaimed shame and received recognition from the straight and cis majority, is it time to assert queer incorrigibility and irreparable undefinability?