Queer Lit

A delightful episode with Mara Gold (St Hilda’s College, Oxford), aka the Sapphic Scholar, who talks to me about Sappho (duh…), homosociality, queer college life in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, lesbian love letters and surprise pubic hair in the queer archives. Mara is a historian, knows her way around Ancient Greece and Egypt, she works on and in museums, and get this: she has even worked as an archaeologist in the field. Best of all, Mara brings a refreshing and entertaining Sapphic perspective to everything she does – including this here podcast. Please note that the sound quality isn’t great but it gets better throughout the episode. Apologies!

People, texts and places mentioned:
Sappho
V&A Museum
Pitt Rivers Museum
HD
Elizabeth Bishop
Katherine Mansfield
Michael Fields
Mary Barnard
Anne Carson (fragment 168b translation)
Eve Sedgewick Kossofsky
Henry Thornton Warton
Sharon Marcus. Between Women: Friendship, Desire, and Marriage in Victorian England. Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, 2007.
If These Walls Could Talk 2

Need more Sappho on your socials? Follow Mara and me on Instagram and Twitter (@sapphic_scholar/@Lena_Mattheis).

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. What is homosociality?
2. Why does Mara study women‘s educational environment? How are colleges Sapphic?
3. Why does Sappho become so important at this particular point in time (end of 19th, beginning of 20th century)?
4. Which functions does Sappho serve in the queer community?
5. Could you comment on the reception history of Sappho’s work? What made this complicated?

In this episode, Dr Daniella Gáti (Brandeis University) explains why the internet is queer, how gaming and the form of the vignette relate to queerness and why we should (or should not) watch Queer Eye. If you're intrigued by the notion of queerness as a a 'blob', give this a listen.

Scholars mentioned in this episode:
Whitney Pow
Bo Ruberg
Lee Edelman
Jack Halberstam
Sara Ahmed (“What’s the Use”, Feminist Killjoy Blog, @SaraNAhmed)
Jen Jack Gieseking (“A Queer New York”, “The Gender, Sexuality, & Space Reading List”, http://jgieseking.org/)
Judith Butler

Films, books, series, magazines and social media mentioned:
Qlit (https://qlit.hu/en/home/)
Autostraddle (https://www.autostraddle.com/)
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: “The Danger of a Single Story” (https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_ngozi_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story?language=en)
@herstorycats
Anna Pulley: “The Lesbian Sex Haiku Book (with Cats!)”
Sarah Waters: “Affinity” and “Tipping the Velvet”
“Queer Eye”
JVN (@jvn, @curiouswithjvn)
Laverne Cox: “Free Cece”

Learn more about Daniella's work here: https://dgati.github.io/ and follow us on Twitter here: @gati_daniella and here: @Lena_Mattheis.

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. What is electronic literature?
2. What is a vignette?
3. What do you think Daniella means by “media-archeological approach”?
4. What does Daniella say about definitions of queerness?
5. How does queerness relate to fragmentation (in texts) and glitches (in games)?
6. When speaking about Whitney Pow’s work, Daniella explains that it is in the nature of archives to erase transness. Why do you think that could be? Can you think of an example?

Prof Susan Lanser (Brandeis University) joins me for this one – what an honour! Sue is one of the architects of narratology and has conducted groundbreaking research on queer women, lesbians and the Sapphic (among 500 other things and while being completely humble, charming and wonderful). In this episode, she provides insights on queerness in history, literature, culture and narrative form. She also talks about her research on Israeli-Palestinian narratives and, of course, about her brilliant book “The Sexuality of History”.

Texts, films and authors mentioned:
Gérard Genette
Valerie Traub
Shlomith Rimmon-Kenan
The Living Handbook of Narratology (Hamburg University)
Sami Adwan and Dan Bar-On’s “Side by Side: Parallel Histories of Israel-Palestine”
“Kiss Me Kosher”
Isaac de Benserade’s “Iphis and Ianthe” (1634, after Ovid)
Poetry of Katherine Phillips
Djuna Barnes’ “Ladies Almanack”
Ocean Vuong’s “On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous”

Sue’s scholarly work mentioned:
(with Shlomith Rimmon-Kenan) "Narratology at the Checkpoint: The Politics and Poetics of Entanglement." Narrative 27.3 (2019): 245-269.
"Queering Narrative Voice." Textual Practice 32.6 (2018): 923-937.
(with Shlomith Rimmon-Kenan) "Israeli–Palestinian narratives and the politics of form: reading Side by Side." European Journal of English Studies 20.3 (2016): 310-325.
"Gender and Narrative." Handbook of Narratology. De Gruyter, 2014. 206-218.
https://www.lhn.uni-hamburg.de/node/86.html
The Sexuality of History: Modernity and the Sapphic, 1565-1830. University of Chicago Press, 2014.
"Speaking in Tongues: Ladies Almanack and the Language of Celebration." Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (1979): 39-46.

Want to find out more about Queer Lit and who I will speak to next? Find me on Twitter (@Lena_Mattheis) or check out pictures of my home office pets on Instagram (lena_mattheis).

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. What is the relationship between Feminism and Queer Studies?
2. What does Sue think about the relationship of content and form in literature?
3. Is there such a thing as queer form?
4. According to Sue, which century is ‘the’ century of the word lesbian?
5. Why is it important to think, not just about the history of sexuality, but also about the sexuality of history?
6. Why is the year 1928 particularly significant in queer literature?

Dr Olu Jenzen (University of Brighton) joins me for this episode on queer screens: from the silver screen, to the small screen to the smartphone screen. We talk about queer film and series, visual activism, digital queer spaces and, guess what, we even talk about queer teeth. Olu does incredible work for and with young trans people, researches their use of social media and also shares her insights on lesbian doppelgangers and queer sensibility in contemporary film and series. Since I am not quite as eloquent as Olu, I mention “technomachismo” when we talk about gendered and racial data bias. As you may have guessed, I meant to say technochauvinism.

Olu’s research mentioned (a lot of it is open access):
The Aesthetics of Global Protest: Visual Culture and Communication (edited by Aidan McGarry, Itir Erhart, Hande Eslen-Ziya, Olu Jenzen, Umut Korkut)
“The symbol of social media in contemporary protest: Twitter and the Gezi Park movement” (Aidan McGarry, Itir Erhart, Hande Eslen-Ziya, Olu Jenzen, Umut Korkut)
“Trans youth and social media: moving between counterpublics and the wider web”
“Queer teeth: exploring traumatic health legacies”
“Revolting doubles: radical Narcissism and the trope of lesbian Doppelgangers”

Series mentioned:
Pose
Lena Waithe’s Twenties
Transparent
Gentleman Jack

Filmmakers mentioned:
Matthew Hellett
Campbell X
Oska Bright Film Festival (Queer Freedom, Love Bites)
https://oskabright.org/

Book mentioned:
Douglas Stuart’s Shuggie Bain

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. What is visual activism?
2. Why is the motif of the doppelganger relevant to queer studies? Can you think of an example of a doppelganger in literature or film?
3. What does Olu say about the connection between Otherness and queerness?
4. What does it mean to do participant-led research?
5. Why are online platforms biased? How does this affect queer life and, in particular, black trans people?
6. What does Olu mean by queer sensibility?

I get to chat with LaVelle Ridley (University of Michigan) about her doctoral research on black trans life narratives in this one and I must say, she’s a tonic. From important observations on the role of storytelling in political and community activism to the deeply personal process of healing that appropriate representation can initiate, LaVelle covers it all. She’s a scholar, an activist, a pisces (hell, yes!), a creative writer, a mermaid, and an absolute delight to talk to. Don’t miss this one; it’s fun!

Texts and people mentioned:
Paradise on the Margins: Lessons and Dreams from Trans Women of Color
https://www.paradiseonthemargins.com/
Atargatis
https://mermaidsuk.org.uk/
Susan Stryker
Maggie Nelson’s “The Argonauts”
Janet Mock’s “Redefining Realness” (2014) and “Surpassing Certainty” (2017)
CeCe McDonald
Toni Newman
Venus Di'Khadijah Selenite
Laverne Cox and Jac Gares’ “FREE Cece!”
Ridley, LaVelle. "Imagining Otherly: Performing Possible Black Trans Feminist Futures in Tangerine." TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly 6.4 (November 2019): 481-490.
LaKisha Simmons
“Tangerine”
Mya Taylor
Kiki Rodriguez
Mj Rodriguez
POSE
Kai Cheng Thom’s “Fierce Femmes and Notorious Liars”
Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself”
https://lavelleridley.wixsite.com/mysite

Need more queer stuff on your socials? Follow LaVelle and me on Twitter (@lridley16/@Lena_Mattheis) and Instagram (academicfish/lena_mattheis).

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. What is life narrative? Can you think of an example for this from literature or film?
2. Where does LaVelle locate the role of storytelling and self narrating? How does it intersect with activism?
3. Which poet does LaVelle quote when she speaks about ‘containing multitudes’? Why is this poet relevant in this context?
4. Why is it productive to trouble genre distinctions? What is a genre?
5. Why does LaVelle find it important to be personal in her research? What does this mean to her?

Dr Alberto Fernández Carbajal (University of Roehampton) tells me all about their insightful book Queer Muslim Diasporas in Contemporary Literature and Film (2019) in this episode. We cover their favourite reads and learn what a Muslim perspective can teach us about queerness. This kind of research is all about changing perspectives and fostering understanding, so I do hope you will be understanding when it comes to the sound of Alberto’s beautiful scarf that I was unable to remove from the audio entirely…

Check out Alberto's book here:
https://manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9781526128102/

Scholars and concepts mentioned:
John McLeod’s Life Lines: Writing Transcultural Adoption
https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/life-lines-writing-transcultural-adoption-9781472590404/
Lena Mattheis’s Translocality in Contemporary City Novels
https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9783030666866
James Procter’s Diaspora
Sara Ahmed’s Queer Phenomenology
Abraham B. Weil’s Trans*versality
Ibn al-'Arabi’s Imaginal

Novels and films mentioned:
Abdellah Taïa’s Salvation Army
Hanif Kureishi’s My Beautiful Laundrette/The Buddha of Suburbia
Ian Iqbal Rashid‘s A Touch of Pink
Ferzan Özpetek's Hamam’s The Turkish Bath (Steam in the US)
Shamim Sarif's I Can't Think Straight
Sally El Hosaini's My Brother the Devil
Rolla Selbak's Three Veils
Rabih Alameddine: Koolaids/The Hakawati
Randa Jarrar's A Map of Home
Maggie Nelson’s The Argonauts
Audrey Lorde’s Zami: A New Spelling of My Name

Guess what? Alberto is on Twitter (@AlbyFCarbajal), as am I (@Lena_Mattheis).

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:
1. Why is it important to think postcolonial and queer perspectives together?
2. What does ‘diaspora’ mean and why is it central to Alberto’s research?
3. What does intersectionality mean here?
4. What is the white saviour?
5. What does Alberto say about Muslim storytelling?

In this episode, Diana Souhami explains how Modernism was fundamentally shaped by lesbians* and queer people. We talk about how Sylvia Beach published Joyce’s "Ulysses" when no publisher would touch it, how Bryher financed penniless artists who then became the crème de la crème of Modernism, how H.D. arguably wrote better imagist poetry than Pound, and which lesbian love affairs resulted in the most enticing scandals. Diana, who I may or may not have heard being referred to as Lesbian Royalty, has written an entire book about this: "No Modernism without Lesbians" (2020). From Paris salons of the early 20th century to fighting the patriarchy in the history books and syllabi of the 21st century, Diana covers it all.

Authors and books mentioned:
Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness
Sappho
Natalie Barney
Getrude Stein
Bryher
H.D.
Sylvia Beach
James Joyce’s Ulysses
T.S. Eliot’s The Wasteland
Ezra Pound
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Ernest Hemingway
Virginia Woolf’s Orlando
Vita Sackville-West
Violet Trefusis’ Broderie Anglaise
Oscar Wilde
Dolly Wilde
Janet Flanner

Publishers mentioned:
Contact Editions
Shakespeare and Company

Visual artists mentioned:
Picasso
Matisse
Cezanne
The Fauves

Diana Souhami’s books mentioned:
Gluck, 1895-1978: Her Autobiography
No Modernism Without Lesbians
Alice and Gertrude
Mrs Keppel and Her Daughter


Find out more about Diana here: https://dianasouhami.com/

If you’re looking for more lesbian content, follow @DianaSouhami on Twitter and check out @Lena_Mattheis as well.

“Silence is the biggest enemy of women* and lesbian women*. […] If you don’t exist, you can’t be any trouble.” (Diana Souhami in this episode)

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. Why were people such as Natalie Barney so inspired by Sappho? Why go back all the way to Ancient Greek poetry?
2. Why was Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness banned?
3. Why, according to Diana, would Modernism not have happened without lesbians*?
4. Why was Sylvia Beach “intrinsic to Modernism”?
5. What is a lavender marriage?
6. Which Paris salons were important for queer women and Modernist artists and why?

In this episode, I am talking to Ashley Thornton (Brighton University) about epicene pronouns and gender-inclusive language. Ashley is a corpus linguist working on singular they in English, Spanish and Russian and has some insights on the history of gender-neutral pronouns as well. The scholars (and Twitter accounts) referenced in this episode are:

Olu Jenzen @DrOluJenzen
Charlotte Stormbom
Laura Hekanaho @LHekanaho
Joshua Paiz (their account's private) @JMPaiz_PhD
Kris Knisley @krisknisely
Kirby Conrod @kirbyconrod
Dennis Baron @DrGrammar
Ute Gabriel and Pascal Gygax

And while you're at it, follow Ashley (@AR_Thornton) and Lena (@Lena_Mattheis) as well or check out @queerlitpodcast on Instagram!

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:
1. What are epicene pronouns? How are they used?
2. What are neopronouns?
3. Is using singular they a recent trend?
4. How does Ashley research the use of singular they? In which languages and contexts?
5. How does research in corpus linguistics work?
6. Why is singular they important for the queer community?

In this episode, Dr Kit Heyam (Northumbria University) shares wonderful tidbits from trans and non-binary histories, talks about their book on queer king Edward II and is generally delightful and clever. Kit also talks about how they approach queering history, the intersections of literary studies and historical research and their favourite contemporary queer reads, such as "The Lauras" by Sara Taylor, "My Autobiography of Carson McCullers" by Jenn Shapland or "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin.

Other texts we talk about:
"Edward II" by Christopher Marlowe
"The Reputation of Edward II, 1305-1697: A Literary Transformation of History" by Kit Heyam
(https://www.aup.nl/en/book/9789463729338/the-reputation-of-edward-ii-1305-1697)
"The Roaring Girl" by Thomas Middleton and Thomas Dekker
Marjorie Rubright' article "Transgender Capacity in Thomas Dekker and Thomas Middleton's The Roaring Girl (1611)', Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies 19.4 (2019), 45-74
"Trumpet" by Jackie Kay
"Middlesex" by Jeffrey Eugenides
"Girl, Woman, Other" by Bernardine Evaristo
"Little Fish" by Casey Plett

Why not follow Kit (@krheyam) and Lena (@Lena_Mattheis) on Twitter and read more about Kit's work as a scholar and activist here: https://kitheyam.com/.

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:
1. How do the study of literature and of history intersect in Kit’s work?
2. Why is it difficult to label historical figures as trans, lesbian or gay? What does Kit do instead?
3. What does Kit say about authorship and contemporary queer literature?
4. The central aim of Kit’s work is to show that transness and queerness are not ‘new’. Why do you think this is important?