Abstract
This chapter breaks with trends to normalize queer within the human sexuality categories (LBGTQI). The authors approach queering as a strategy for unsettling all normative categories, not just the binary categories of human gender/sexual. They argue that it is just as important to queer normative notions of nature, as structured by the foundational nature/culture divide, as it is to queer the cultural constructions of gender and sexuality. They offer narrative descriptions of three very different queer performative events that mess up the categorical boundaries between nature and culture. The first is an ecosexual performance of queer love for the earth. The second is a performance of queer kinship between children and kangaroos. The third is performance of queer kind in an art installation of a children’s nursery.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Notes
- 1.
The events recounted in ‘performing queer love’ are taken from the website http://sexecology.org/
- 2.
For more on queering anthroponormativity, the normative assumptions of human-centrism, see Taylor and Blaise (2014).
- 3.
The narratives described in ‘performing queer kin’ are excerpts from Affrica Taylor’s field notes from her ethnographic ‘children’s common worlds’ research, conducted in Canberra, Australia, 2013.
- 4.
This narrative about Mindy’s visit to Julia de Ville’s Phantasmagoria exhibition is part of a larger post-qualitative inquiry about monstrous childhoods (Blaise 2016).
References
Allen, L., Rasmussen, M. L., & Quinlivan, K. (Eds.). (2014). The politics of pleasure in sexuality education: Pleasure bound. New York/London: Routledge.
Barad, K. (2007). Meeting the universe halfway: Quantum physics and the entanglement of matter and meaning. Durham/London: Duke University Press.
Barad, K. (2012). Nature’s queer performativity. Vninder, Køn & Forskning Nr, 1–2, 25–53.
Bennett, J. (2010). Vibrant matter: A political economy of things. Durham/London: Duke University Press.
Blaise, M. (2016). Fabricated childhoods: Uncanny encounters with the more-than-human. Discourse: Studies in the politics of education, 37(5), pp. 617–626.
Braidotti, R. (2013). The posthuman. Cambridge/Malden: Polity Press.
Butler, J. (1990). Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity. New York/London: Routledge.
Chisholm, D. (2010). Biophilia, creative involution, and the ecological future of queer desire. In C. Mortimer-Sandilands & B. Erickson (Eds.), Genealogy of queer ecologies (pp. 359–382). Bloomfield: Indiana University Press.
Daston, L., & Vidal, F. (2004). Introduction: Doing what comes naturally. In L. Daston, & F. Vidal (Eds.), The moral authority of nature (pp. 1–20). Chicago/London: Chicago University Press.
Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1983). Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and schizophrenia. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Giffney, N., & Hird, M. J. (Eds.). (2008). Queering the non/human. Hampshire/Burlington: Ashgate.
Haraway, D. (1994). ‘A game of cat’s cradle: Science studies, feminist theory, cultural studies’, Configurations, 2(1): 59–71.
Haraway, D. (2004a). Cyborgs, coyotes, and dogs: A kinship of feminist figurations, and, there are always more things going on than you thought: Methodologies as thinking technologies. An interview with Donna Haraway conducted in two parts by N. Lykke, R. Markussen, & F. Olesen. In D. Haraway (Ed.), The Haraway reader (pp. 321–342). New York/London: Routledge.
Haraway, D. (2004b). Teddy bear patriarchy: Taxidermy in the Garden of Eden, New York City, 1908–1936. In D. Haraway (Ed.), The Haraway reader (pp. 151–197). New York/London: Routledge.
Haraway, D. J. (2008a). Companion species, mis-recognition, and queer worlding. In N. Giffney, & M. J. Hird (Eds.), Queering the non/human (pp. xxiii–xxvi). Hampshire/Burlington: Ashgate.
Haraway, D. J. (2008b). When species meet. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Haraway, D. J. (2015). Anthropocene, plantationocene, chlthulucene: Making kin. Environmental Humanities, 6, 159–165.
Hird, M. (2004). Naturally queer. Feminist Theory, 5(1), 85–89.
Hird, M. J. (2008). Animal trans. In N. Giffney & M. J. Hird (Eds.), Queering the non/human (pp. 227–248). Hampshire/Burlington: Ashgate.
Jagose, A. (1996). Queer theory. Melbourne: University of Melbourne Press.
Kirby, V. (2006). Judith Butler: Live theory. London: Continuum.
Latour, B. (2004). The politics of nature: How to bring the sciences into democracy (trans: Porter, C.). Cambridge, MA/London: Harvard University Press.
Mortimer-Sandilands, C., & Erickson, B. (2010). Genealogy of queer ecologies. In C. Mortimer-Sandilands & B. Erickson (Eds.), Queer ecologies, sex, nature, politics, desire (pp. 1–42). Bloomfiel: Indiana University Press.
Rasmussen, M. L., & Allen, L. (2014). What can a concept do? Rethinking education’s queer assemblages. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 35(3), 433–443.
Sedgwick, E. K. (1990). Epistemology of the Closet, Berkley/Los Angeles: University of California Press.Stephens, E. (2011). When I knew. The Journal of EcoSex Research, 1(1), 8–14. Retrieved July 25, 2015, from http://www.loveartlab.org/PDF/Journalecosex.pdf
Stephens, E., & Sprinkle, A. (2013). Goodbye Gauley Mountain: An ecosexual love story. Distributed by Kino and Lorber.
Stephens, E., & Sprinkle, A. (nd). Sex ecology: Where art meets theory meets practice meets activism. Retrieved July 25, 2015, from www.sexecology.org
Talburt, S., & Rasmussen, M. L. (2010). ‘After-queer’ tendencies in queer research. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 23(1), 1–14. doi:10.1080/09518390903447184.
Taylor, A. (2013). Reconfiguring the natures of childhood. London/New York: Routledge.
Taylor, A., & Blaise, M. (2014). Queer worlding childhood. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 35(3), 377–392.
Whatmore, S. (2002). Hybrid geographies: Natures, cultures, spaces. London: Sage.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2017 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Taylor, A., Blaise, M. (2017). Queer Departures into More-Than-Human Worlds. In: Allen, L., Rasmussen, M.L. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Sexuality Education. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-40033-8_29
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-40033-8_29
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-40032-1
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-40033-8
eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)