Queer Lit

Be it about Marmite or podcasts, I’ve always believed that more is more, so here is part two of the end-of-year special, where I ask former Queer Lit guests: What is the queerest thing you did this year? Featuring: Susan Stryker, Nick McGlynn, J.P. Der Boghossian, and Jas Morgan. What a cast!

Oh, yes, you heard right: It’s a festive end-of-year special! Making resolutions and rules is not very queer, so we are celebrating the year in all its gaiety instead! Tune in to hear about the queerest things my Queer Lit guests did this year.

References:

Dyking Out
“Queer Rural Spaces and Asexualities” with Joe Jukes
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/48480045
CTSG Centre for Transforming Sexuality and Gender (University of Brighton)
The Radical Faeries of Albion
Lesbian Lives
“Sappho Fest” with Leah Davidson
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/51209111
“Activists, Artists and Academics” with Katherine O’Donnell
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/49146151
Irish Women’s Camp
“Lesbian Ghosts” with Naoise Murphy
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/49146044
Kate O’Brien
Mara Gold
@sapphic_scholar
“Non-binary Life“ with Meg-John Barker
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/48558860
Bonnie Badenoch
Sara Ahmed
Jack Halberstam
https://www.rewriting-the-rules.com/self/queer-joy/
The Queery
Carol Ann Duffy’s The Frost Fair
“Dressing Dykes” with Eleanor Medhurst
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/49146115
@dressingdykes
https://dressingdykes.com/
Grace Ellis‘ Flung Out of Time
Tillie Walden’s On A Sunbeam
Lumberjanes
Carol

Have you ever thought about how your queer life is connected to the land that you live it on? In this episode, Joshua Whitehead (University of Calgary) will take you on a Two-Spirit Indigiqueer journey from Stonewall in New York to the Forks in Winnipeg. Josh talks about how healing communion with the land is, how the stories of our queer bodies need to be read and told in relation to place, and about how genre can be as violent and racist of a category as gender. Would you like your serving of decolonial queer theory and creativity with a dash of Cardi B today? Then this is the episode for you.

If you’re anything like me, you will absolutely need to see photographic evidence of Josh’s shepherd Chief now. Head over to Insta or Twitter and follow @jwhitehead204. The podcast cats are purring over at @queerlitpodcast.


Works by Joshua mentioned:

full-metal indigiqueer (2017)
Jonny Appleseed (2018)
Making Love With the Land (2022)

Other people, texts and terms mentioned:

Thor Ragnarok
Peguis
Cardi B
Oji-Cree
Nehiyaw
Leanne Betasamosake Simpson As We’ve Always Done and “Indigenous Queer Normativity”
Anishinaabe
Ojibwe
Biotext
Biostory
Post-contact nations
Métis
Myra Laramee
Stonewall
Marsha P Johnson
Sylvia Rivera
Wendigo
Fred Wah
Michael Ondaatje
David Palumbo-Liu
Garth Greenwell
Sky Lee
Daniel Health Justice
Wonderworking
Cherokee
“Two-Spirit Literature” with Lisa Tatonetti
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/50303918
“Queer Indigenous Literature” with Jas Morgan
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/50152848
Princess Mononoke
Hayao Miyazaki
Studio Ghibli
Maori: pukapuka
Otâcimow
ᓀᐦᐃᔭᐍᐏᐣ nēhiyawēwin
Michel Foucault
Frantz Fanon
Sigmund Freud
Judith Butler
Achille Mbembe’s Necropolitics
Gregory Scofield’s Thunder Through My Veins
Anne of Green Gables
Little House on the Prairie
Kihtwam


Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1.How does Josh describe queer relationships and interactions with the land? Which examples does he give?

2.What does Two-Spirit mean? When was the term created?

3.Which community coined the term ‘biotext’ and how does Josh alter it to suit his own writing?

4.Josh talks about the work the reader has to put in to follow the syllabics in “A Geography of Queer Woundings”. How does this relate to ‘glossing’ in post-colonial theory?

5.Reflect on whether or how your own body plays a role when you read or write queer texts, whether that is ‘theory’ or ‘fiction’ or anything in between.

Let’s get magical! In this episode, Prof Jes Battis (University of Regina) explains why magic is queer (or why queerness is magical?) and how wizards and witches live out their queerness in medieval texts as well in contemporary retellings. Jes also conjures up wonderful examples of how neurodiversity, queerness and witchcraft are all linked. Side effects of listening to this spellbinding episode may include: a deeper understanding of neuroqueerness, latent transness turning into overt trans joy, an intense desire to read more young adult fiction.

Ready to get enchanted? Follow @jesbattis and @queerlitpodcast on Twitter and Instagram for that extra glamour.

Work by Jes mentioned:

Occult Special Investigator and Parallel Parks series
Mastering the Game of Thrones (edited by Jes Battis and Susan Johnston)
Supernatural Youth (edited by Jes Battis)
Blood Relations: Chosen Family in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel
Thinking Queerly: Medievalism, Wizardry, and Neurodiversity in YA Texts
The Winter Knight ( @ecwpress )
https://jbattis.com/

Other works, people and characters mentioned:

Gandalf
Lord of the Rings
Nick Walker
Remi Yergeau
Neuroqueer
Merlin
Grisandolus
Gabrielle Bychowski
https://www.publicmedievalist.com/author/gabrielle-bychowski/
The Prose Merlin
Taliesin
“Medieval Disney Queers” with Amy Louise Morgan
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/51169776
Morgan Le Fay
The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina Spellman
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Tiresias
T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land
Queer As Fact: “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight”
https://queerasfact.podbean.com/e/sir-gawain-and-the-green-knight/
Marion Zimmer Bradley’s The Mists of Avalon
Willow and Tara (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
Amy Rose Capetta and Cori McCarthy’s Once and Future
Percival
T.H. White’s The Sword in the Stone (The Once and Future King)
“Wildness, Masculinity and Swimming Pools” with Jack Halberstam
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/46140271
James Knowles’ King Arthur and his Knights (illustrated by Louis Rhead)
Geoffrey of Monmouth’s The History of the Kings of Britain and the Life of Merlin
Compulsory able-bodiedness
Robert McRuer
ablebodied gaze
Potterverse
Tolkien’s The Hobbit
Ursula K. Le Guin
Michael Ende’s The Neverending Story
Nnedi Okorafor
Nicola Griffith’s Hild
T.L. Huchu’s The Library of the Dead and Our Lady of Mysterious Ailments
Imogen Binnie’s Nevada

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1.Which queer wizards does Jes talk about?
2.You are probably familiar with several of the supernatural beings mentioned in the episode. Have you ever thought about them as queer or neurodiverse?
3.Jes and I talk about the parallels between compulsory able-bodiedness and compulsory heterosexuality. What are these parallels? Do you agree with this line of thinking?
4.Please look up at least one of the scholars mentioned in the episode and find out a little more about their work.
5.Can you think of other examples of wizards, witches or supernatural beings that can be read as queer or neurodiverse?

Spoiler alert: Jane Traies is the best. And this episode is proof that if you don’t know any older, wiser lesbians already, you’re missing out! Jane talks to me about (in)visibility across queer generations, about queer kinship and (very efficient) lesbian networks, about the stories of LGBTQIA+ asylum seekers and about biphobia and exclusionism. From being friends with your ex to Peg Cruikshank’s favourite flannel shirt, we serve you only the most sapphic topics.

Want to be part of Jane’s network now? Follow @JaneTraies and @queerlitpodcast on Twitter. If you want to see what a colourblind person’s Insta looks like, follow @queerlitpodcast.

Texts and people mentioned:

“The Butch” with Amy Tooth Murphy
Jane Traies’ “Old Lesbians in the UK: Community and Friendship” Journal of Lesbian Studies (2015)
Sally Munt
Peg Cruikshank
Monika Kehoe
Hester Thrale
Samuel Johnson
Jay Taverner’s Liberty ( @jaytaverner )
Carol S. Becker’s Unbroken Ties: Lesbian Ex-Lovers (1988)
Jane Traies’ The Lives of Older Lesbians and Now You See Me
LISG Lesbian Immigration Support Group ( @lisg_manchester )
https://lisg.uk/
Jane Traies’ Free to Be Me
Refugee Tales ( @refugeetales )
Maureen Duffy’s The Microcosm
Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1.Why is Jane interested in studying older lesbians?
2.What role do you think age, age groups and generations play in queer kinship? How do changing laws and societal attitudes play into this?
3.How might friendship take on a different role in the lives of (older and younger) lesbians and queer people?
4.Jane and I talk about the word lesbian and its association with identity politics. How would you summarise Jane’s thoughts on this and what are yours?
5.What is the first queer book you remember reading?

Once upon a midnight dreary, Queer Lit pondered all things eerie… and believe me, this episode is quaint and curious queer horror galore! Horror writer and researcher Lucy Holmes take us on a trip down vampire lane and chills me to the bone with everything from 1930s gay directors to 1970s lesbian bloodsuckers to nonbinary and trans representation in contemporary horror shows. Lucy also reminds us that horror, just like your queer identity, can mean anything you want it to mean. And yes, of course, we talk Buffy and Alien!

If you’re not too spooked out, follow @lulu_pew and @queerlitpodcast on Instagram and Twitter and tell all your scary friends.

Texts by Lucy mentioned:

“Horror in the Closet” in Hear Us Scream ( @hearusscream )
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hear-Us-Scream-Voices-Horror/dp/B09M7F3SN3
“Breaking Bloody Binaries”
https://www.hearusscream.com/editorials/breaking-bloody-binaries
“Silencing Sapphics”
https://www.hearusscream.com/editorials/silencing-sapphics-a-mirror-image-between-killing-eve-and-bly-manor
“Sapphics Bite Back” in Ghouls Magazine

Other texts and concepts mentioned:

Hays Code
Ghoulfriends Podcast ( @GhoulFriendPod )
https://mobile.twitter.com/ghoulfriendpod
“Queerness and Race in Gothic and Horror” with Maisha Wester
Abigail Waldron’s Queer Screams
Dragula
James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931)
Psycho
Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope
Fear Street
Chucky
#UntoldTales
Ripley
Alien
Evil Dead
Murnau’s Nosferatu
Max Schreck
Killing Eve
Bly Manor
First Kill
Dracula’s Daughter
Buffy
True Blood
Freaky (Blumhouse)
Misha Osherovich
They/Them
Scream
Wings
Marlene Dietrich
Dandy
Bury your gays trope
The L Word
The Wilds
#SaveGentlemanJack with Sarah Wingrove
Yellowjackets
Assassination Nation
Bit
Interview with a Vampire
Daughters of Darkness
Vampire Lesbos
The Vampire Lovers
The Hunger
Final Girls Podcast
Queen of the Damned
Let the right one come in
Elizabeth Bathory
Vincent Price
House of Haunted Hill
“Medieval Disney Queers” with Amy Louise Morgan
Sleepaway Camp
Candyman
Shudder
Queer for Fear
Hannibal
Mads Mikkelsen
Tag
Gillian Anderson
Nightmare on Elm Street
Freddy
Velvet Buzzsaw
Buffering the Vampire Slayer
Carol Clover’s Men, Women, and Chainsaws

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1.How would you define horror?
2.Why might queer people be drawn to horror as a genre? Which possible answer does Lucy give? What do you think?
3.What is potentially problematic about queer representation in horror?
4.Have you ever identified with a monster? If so, which one?
5.Please look up Jack Halberstam’s work on queer monsters. What do you notice about his approach?

It’s crossover time! In this week’s episode, Queer Lit enters a unicorn union with This Queer Book Saved My Life!, a brilliant new podcast by J.P. Der Boghossian. Before we get to the books that were our personal saviours, J.P. and I talk about The Queer Armenian Library – a digital resource of queer Armenian texts, shows, films, poetry and so much more. In addition to creating incredibly impactful projects such as these two, J.P. is also extraordinarily lovely to chat to. We laugh, we sigh… an unmissable double feature that will turn you gay on the spot.

Want to keep up to date with what J.P. does next? I sure do, which is why I follow @jpderboghossian and @queerlitpodcast on Twitter and Instagram.

Texts, people and resources mentioned:

@jpderboghossian
https://jpderboghossian.com/
The Queer Armenian Library ( @readtheQAL )
https://queerarmenianlibrary.com/
This Queer Book Saved My Life ( @thisqueerbook )
https://thisqueerbook.com/
GALAS Gay and Lesbian Armenian Society
Armenian Weekly
Mika Artyan’s Unzipped: Gay Armenia
http://gayarmenia.blogspot.com/
Bookshop.org ( @bokshop_org_uk )
Arlene Voski Avakian’s Lion Woman’s Legacy
Moshin Hamid’s Exit West
Michael Cunningham’s A Home at the End of the World
Kate Davies’ In at the Deep End
Chloe Caldwell’s Women
Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home and The Secret to Superhuman Strength
Carmen Maria Machado’s In the Dream House
Lara Lillibridge, author of Girl-ish and Mama Mama
Nancy Agabian, author of Me as Her Again
Dr. Joe Perazzo – Assistant Professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Nursing
Greg Louganis’ Breaking the Surface
S.A. Chant’s Peter Darling
The Queery (@thequeerybtn )
Andrea Gibson’s “Orlando” ( @andrewgibby )
Mary Lambert
Virginia Woolf’s Orlando
Michael Barakiva’s One Man Guy
Heartstopper

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1.What role can specialised collections like the Queer Armenian Library play for individuals but also for queer life and culture more broadly?
2.If you were to create a queer library, what special kind of queer literature would it house?
3.What does JP say about the role of representation in queer lives and literatures? What are your thoughts?
4.Please find one scholarly text that you could use to write about the role of representation for marginalised communities. Which one did you pick and why?
5.And of course I must ask: Which queer book saved your life?

Oo-De-Lally! Dr Amy Louise Morgan (she/her, Surrey University) tells me tales of feminist dragons, gender-nonconforming foxes, wild princesses and all kinds of other queer characters from Disney’s medieval(ish) films. We compare favourite VHS tapes, most fantastic princesses, and try to figure out whether we (or was it just me?) wanted to be, or be with, Robin Hood. Amy also tells me all about Disney’s problematic relationship to queerness, why queer fans still relate to it so much, and what positive changes are possibly in store. Golly, what an episode!

If this episode awoke the medieval fanperson in you, follow @AmyLouise921 and @queerlitpodcast on Twitter. @queerlitpodcast is also on Insta. No dragons though, just cats.

Texts, characters and films mentioned:

Morgan, Amy Louise. "“To Play bi an Orchardside”: Orchards as Enclosures of Queer Space in Lanval and Sir Orfeo." The Medieval and Early Modern Garden in Britain. Routledge, 2018. 91-101.

Locus amoenus

Sleeping Beauty

Sword in the Stone

Robin Hood

Brave

Lady Kluck

Jack Halberstam’s Female Masculinity

Maleficent

Perceforest (c. 1330-1340)

Grimm’s Fairy Tales

Charles Perrault

The Little Mermaid

Pinocchio

Snow White

Sir Orfeo

Jeffrey Jerome Cohen

Madam Mim

Loathly Lady trope

#GiveElsaAGirlfriend

Merida

Frozen

Wreck it Ralph

Disney Princesses

SGS episode

Brenda Chapman

ELMS

Robyn Muir

Mulan

Atlantis

Hunchback of Notre-Dame

Belle

Beauty and the Beast

Lightyear

Luca

Hays Code

The Reluctant Dragon

Robert Benchley

Kenneth Grahame

How To Train Your Dragon

Jack Halberstam’s Wild Things

“Wildness, Masculinity and Swimming” with Jack Halberstam

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. First things first, what is your favourite Disney film and why?

2. What do you think is the most problematic Disney film and why?

3. We speak quite a bit about anthropomorphised characters. Why do these offer themselves for a queer reading?

4. How does queerness relate to monstrosity and fairies? Can you think of other monsters that are frequently read as queer?

5. Please look up Jack Halberstam. Why do you think Amy recommends his book in this context

Listen up, glitterati, we have some eco-friendly scholarship coming your way: Prof Nicole Seymour (California State University, Fullerton) shares her thoughts on queer ecologies, trans ecologies, petrol masculinities, trashy environmentalism and, most importantly, glitter. In a sparkling synopsis of all things queer environmentalism, Nicole explains why the doom-and-gloom narrative of climate justice is so passé and encouragement and future-oriented thinking are on the rise. Nicole even shares her favourite ecowarrior drag queens.

The future is… still pretty bleak! To make learning about positive change more fun, follow @nseymourPHD and @queerlitpodcast on Twitter. @queerlitpodcast is also on Instagram.

Work by Nicole mentioned:

Strange Natures: Futurity, Empathy, and the Queer Ecological Imagination
Bad Environmentalism: Affect and Dissent in the Ecological Age @UMinnPress
Glitter @BloomsburyAcad
Seymour, Nicole. "’Good animals’: The past, present, and futures of trans ecology." Transecology. Routledge, 2020. 190-204.

Other texts and people mentioned:

Simon Amstell
Adrienne Maree Brown
Earth Overshoot Day
Petrol cultures
Daggett, Cara. "Petro-masculinity: Fossil fuels and authoritarian desire." Millennium 47.1 (2018): 25-44.
Madeleine Bavley
Reich, Nicholas Tyler. "Truck Sluts, Petrosexual Countrysides, and Trashy Environmentalisms." Transgender Studies Quarterly 9.1 (2022): 65-83.
Tom McCarthy’s Satin Island
The Bearded Ladies Cabaret @beardedladiescabaret (Insta) @KnowYourBeards (Twitter)
CAConrad @caconrad88
The Trolls
Timothy Morton
“Queering Nothing” with Lee Edelman
Bruce Bagemihl
Callum Angus’ A Natural History of Transition
Oliver Baez Bendorf @oliverbaezbendorf (Insta) @queerpoetics (Twitter)
“Drag and Panto” with Nick Cherryman
Pattie Gonia @pattiegonia
Shiloh Krupar’s Hot Spotter’s Report
Tammie Brown
RuPaul’s Drag Race
#plasticfreepride
Carson McCuller’s The Member of the Wedding and The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
Jen Shapland’s My Autobiography of Carson McCullers
Maria Sulimma

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1.What is queer ecology or what can it be? What is trans ecology?
2.What are petrol cultures or petrol masculinities?
3.How does drag relate to environmentalism?
4.Nicole talks about modes to convey environmentalism. Which modes or narrative patterns do we discuss? Can you think of others?
5.What does glitter mean to you?

Join us on the Lesbian beach for a sapphic special episode with someone I am very lucky to call a friend: Leah Davidson. Leah is a queer therapist, a hiking dyke, a lesbian mom, an extremely clever reader and an absolute joy. On the beach in Skala Eressos, we talk about the early days of the lesbian* community that travels to Lesvos every summer, in search of connection, queer roots, and poetry. Tune in now to transport yourself to the Sappho Festival and learn about some of Leah’s favourite reads.

Find out more about lovely, lovely Leah on leahdavidson.com or by following Leah Davidson Psychotherapy on Facebook. For some visual impressions of the festival and the island, follow @queerlitpodcast on Instagram and Twitter.

Places, people and texts mentioned:

https://lesvossolidarity.org/en/
@lesvossolidarity
@safepassage.lesvossolidarity
@gagaanimalcare
Meg-John Barker
Tzeli Hadjidimitriou
https://www.odoiporikon.com/node/155
Selby Wynn Schwartz’ After Sappho
Natalie Barney
Renée Vivien
Diana Souhami
Mytilene
Carmen Maria Machado’s In The Dream House
Carolina De Robertis's Cantoras
Jane Traies
Torrey Peters’ Detransition, Baby!
Judy Grahn’s A Woman is Talking to Death and Another Mother Tongue: Gay Words, Gay Worlds
Eleanor Medhurst ( @dressingdykes )
Laura Kate Dale (ed.) Gender Euphoria
Ohana ( @ohanahotellesvos )
Evelyn Torton Beck’s Nice Jewish Girls: A Lesbian Anthology
Audre Lorde’s Siter Outsider
Adrienne Rich’s On Lies, Secrets, and Silence
Pat Parker
Briona Simone Jones‘ Mouths of Rain
Sister Write
AJ ( @goodfoodbyaj )
Judith Butler

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1.What is your favourite queer beach read?
2.How much do you know about Sappho? Please look her up and read some of her poetry.
3.Leah talks about pinkie rings as queer code and Sappho has created another one through her poetry: violets. Which other queer codes do you know?
4.Leah talks about many moments of queer joy that she has experienced on Lesvos. What is a space of queer joy for you?