Exploring The Strengths And Weaknesses Of The Term ' Queer '

The word “gay” has gone through drastic changes. Traditionally, it was a positive term that meant to be “happily excited” or “jolly” (Merriam Webster, “Gay”). It was used regularly to express one’s feelings about life. Today, it has a far different meaning. Now people use the word gay to label homosexuals, those with feminine qualities, or those who do something thought to be outside of the norm for their gender. “Being gay” went from expressing someone’s happiness to describing his sexual preference. The definition of gay has changed so much that its original meaning has become archaic and lost to the times.

In several cases, the desire to kill the queer self also occurs when it seems impossible to move forward without fully accepting and presenting oneself as queer. When this idea is seen on television it is presented in both the interpersonal and introspective forms. For example, the characters that attempt suicide, such as the eight queer women characters between 2001 and 2016, are illustrating the introspective act of assassinating the queer self by killing themselves. In contrast the interpersonal aspect derives from the idea of identity as zero-sum and therefore the queer characters who do not cover present a threat to the stability and validity of gay characters on screen. This paper will specifically investigate how the interpersonal side of "assassinating the queer selves" plays out on screen as a way to reinforce the importance of

The Rocky display features a bruised Stallone with Westmore’s prosthetics pasted onto his swollen eye and broken nose (Fig. 3) and would be moved to the lower right hand corner of the exhibit. This rugged and overt machismo offered by Stallone starkly contrasts the sensuous display of Hepburn in the other corner, denoting the spatial configuration of femininity and masculinity. Notably, Tyburczy expounds on Judith Butler’s theory of performativity and spatial configuration by stating that it is the “process of socialization whereby gender and sexual identities are produced through regulating and citational practices” (Tyburczy 12). The regulations that Westmore and the curators maintain are that “monolithic” structures of gender are essential to Hollywood media, placing binaries of both masculinity and femininity. To avoid siphoning off past histories and straying from the rigid boundaries of masculinity, placing video footage of actual representations of marginalized communities would disrupt the power struggle between queer communities and dominant communities. Specifically, footage of the Stonewall Riots in the 1960’s would introduce discomfort politics and therefore would unleash a new conversation about rigid masculinity in mainstream media. Moreover,

In his article "The Screwball Bromance: Regression, Bisexuality, And Reconfigured Masculinity In Step Brothers" R. Colin Tait offers a close look at the movie Step Brothers arguing that despite its “low” form, the movie represents a brave attempt to redefine the concept of masculinity and normalize homosexual relationships among men in the eyes of wide audience. The author expresses this point by claiming that the movie represents a “critique of capitalist and heteronormative ideology” (Tait 2). However, this claim is not supported unambiguously throughout the article. The key question about the writing under discussion can be formulated as follows: on what basis has Tait concluded that the relationship between the main male characters of the movie has romantic rather than merely friendly character?

There seems to be a prevalent belief among queer theorists that there exists an archetype of the “ideal queer.” This person is subversive in everything that they do, and disrupts norms in all ways. Obviously, this ideal is different from dominant society’s view of the ideal queer - a person who keeps their identity to themself, is not “outwardly queer,” holds some type of stable corporate job, is “just like the rest of us” in all other aspects of being, and is decidedly non-radical. Of course, neither of these ideals are representative of the reality of LGBT individuals. Gender and sexual expression is infinitely varied, and cannot be boxed into categories which are palatable to one group or another. LGBT individuals who chose to marry or

Queer Evolution describes how queer transformed from a hateful word to a mainstream word. Although she specifically uses the history of the word queer, the same ideas can be said for many other words. Irvine explains “in the 1920s and ‘30s the word queer became synonymous with “pansy”, “sissy”, and even “pervert”. That is not the case anymore in

The Celluloid Closet explores representation in film and its enormous effect on American culture. Although the film was originally released in 1995, many of the same issues around queer representation in media still remain over twenty years later. Gay characters are often the sidekick in stories revolving around heterosexual heroes, and queer stereotypes like “The Sissy” still persistent nearly 80 years after the character first appeared; and although queer erasure is not a prevalent as it was in the 1950s and 1960s, with entire plots being changed to hide queer elements, queer stories are still hijacked in subtler ways. Notably, queer characters are still regularly played by straight actors. Furthermore, these straight actors often win prestigious

In her introduction, Irvine says that “Something queer is happening to the word “queer,”” (p.477). She bases her claim on direct quotations a variety of individuals, such as Gregory Ward and Trish Mcdermott. Gregory Ward, a Northwestern University linguist who teaches a course on language and sexuality, claims that the entertainment industry is changing the word’s image, because of it being commonly used. Furthermore, “Trish Mcdermott, a vice president of “romance” at the Match.com online dating service, says she’s seeing the word appear more often in personal ads.”

In my undergraduate Queer film class we viewed the film XXY Viewing XXY rekindled my interest in intersex people. I searched the Internet trying to find more intersex films to watch and was stunned to find that the list was less than 15 films short. Both was among these films. With so much weight on these films’ metaphorical shoulders,

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).

When researching a topic to delve into, I decided to fuse together homosexuality (interestingly presented in Abdellatif Kechiche’s Blue Is the Warmest Colour), and the stigma attached to this prominently in 1940s in France. I find this interesting because audiences of a contemporary mind-set - my target audience, would be exposed to a time before people were accepted for being themselves. Although set in present time, a flashback provokes the main drive of the narrative; the two male protagonists are hinted to fall in love when one abruptly leaves for the war. Genre proves problematic when attaching a label to a diverse film. It can narrow any discourse a writer may take when having to adhere to specific conventions; thus I attempted to categorise my screenplay as romance-drama which ultimately deviates from the expectations of an atypical

Queer theory questions creations of normal and divergent, insider, and outsider.2 Queer theorists analyse a situation or a text to determine the relationship between sexuality, power and gender. Queer theory challenges basic tropes used to organize our society and our language: even words are gendered, and through that gendering an elliptical view of the hierarchy of society, and presumption of what is male and what is female, shines through. Queer theory rejects such binary distinctions as arbitrarily determined and defined by those with social power. It works to deconstruct these binaries, particularly the homosexual/heterosexual binary.4

Both come with some backlash. Many queer individuals fit into a subgroup of the heteronormative lifestyle that is normalized. By that, I mean planning to live a “normal” life that includes: having one partner, getting married, only sleeping with one another, raising children, settling down, and buying a house one day. By subgroup, I refer to the fact that there are many hetero imposed “normalities” that exist, for instance, the one created by the porn industry. However, there are fallbacks in the eyes of some queer individuals on the idea of hetero imposed “normality’s.” In reference, to the book Gay Shame, which attempts to argue that the shame of being queer, is part of being queer. Furthermore, that normalizing what it means to be queer both ostracizes those still not accepted as “normal” and takes away a part of what it means to be queer and not fitting into the heteronormative ideal. The importance of this theory is that it eludes to the ability of film. Film has the dual ability to showcase the existence of queers while providing a hetero imposed ideal version of

The Queer Theory is affecting several individuals in today’s society. Many people may have probably laughed at the title of this topic (including myself) or simply reading the word “queer”, but it wasn’t until I actually started researching this topic that I began trying to put myself in the shoes of these people known as “queers”. The word “Queer,” usually refers to anyone who is basically (LBGT), Lesbian, Bisexual, Gay or Transgender, but has other meanings too. In this article, Dissenting with queer theory: reading Ranciere queerly; the author Adam Greteman unfolds the true meaning of Queer, its contradictions; how humor brings a function to argue about the educational aspect of it; as well as how the queer theory may be

Homosexuality on screen has been a taboo subject since the creation of film in the late nineteenth century, and has remained that way until the violent protests of the 1970s sexual revolution. Consequently, the neglection concerning the portrayal of gay community members can be linked to the overuse and dehumanization of queer stereotypes used as comedic relief throughout film history. The overall postponement in the representation of homosexuals paused the long march for equal rights even outside of the cinematic world. In result of conservative rejection toward such liberal topics, filmmakers had to conceal “queer cinema” as production codes enforced strict laws, but as time progressed, so did the involvement of the LGBTQ community in the cinema.