Queer Kinship in Sarah Schulmans AIDS Novels

Queer Kinship in Sarah Schulman's AIDS Novels is the first book to extensively discuss the works of Sarah Schulman, a journalist, activist and globally recognized novelist.

Autorentext

Jaroslaw Milewski holds a PhD in Literature from the University of Lódz, where he currently works as a teaching assistant at the Department of American Literature. He is also an editorial secretary of InterAlia: A Journal of Queer Studies.

Klappentext

Queer Kinship in Sarah Schulman's AIDS Novels is the first book to extensively discuss the works of Sarah Schulman, a journalist, activist and globally recognized novelist.

Zusammenfassung

Queer Kinship in Sarah Schulman's AIDS Novels is the first book to extensively discuss the works of Sarah Schulman, a journalist, activist and globally recognized novelist. This research monograph juxtaposes the works about the AIDS epidemic which were well-received by the mainstream America with Schulman's own output as a bard of AIDS burnout, in the words of Edmund White. In contrast with the prevailing representations of the epidemic, her works emphasize the importance of queer kinship, chosen families and AIDS activist groups that fall outside of the heteronorm. Bearing witness to these voluntary collectivities means also surviving the traumatizing experience of ongoing, repeated death and refusing the idea of an easy solution to the crisis. The monograph tracks the tension between the dominant narratives about the epidemic and those articulated from the excluded positions, arguing that Schulman reformulates queer kinship as the locus of social change.

Inhalt

Introduction

Queer Kinship and the Culture Industry

Biopolitics of The Culture Industry

Sex and Kinship

The Scapegoating of Patient O

Thicker Than Blood

Monogamy as a Cure

A Simulacrum of Diversity

A Lifetime of Resistance

Activists and Bohemians

Forgetful Bohemians

Meaningful Kinship

Acting up for Justice

Witnessing Among Rats

"Familial Homophobia..."

"...and Its Consequences"

Unbearable Witnessing

No Country for the Rats

Towards Queer Kinship

Queer Fractures

One of Us

The Normal Love

Conclusion