Query #7: What is queer or queering?


Yesterday in class, I wanted you all to think about your own definition of queer. I asked the question: (in the midst of our discussion of punishment and discipline) Is queer--as an action or an identity or something else--necessarily undisciplined? What is the relationship between queer and discipline or being disciplined?

Drawing upon your experiences tracking your term, the class readings, our discussions, and any other sources, what is your definition of queer?


I tend to see the definitions of terms as the sum (of what I know) of what is written about or meant by them -- not a very nuanced or sophisticated method.
Even though I disidentify with the word for many reasons, ideally, I wish for the term queer to signify the possibility of many different outcomes or realities, a space that allows anything to exist, refraining from imposing a hegemonic, structured narrative onto that which lives there. However, the way the term 'queer' has been framed by some theorists, there tends to be a very thick boundary around it that keeps everything that is deemed 'not queer' out, often without justifying its claim. Like all labels people attach themselves to, I think people sometimes use the term queer to make themselves feel special and that it's use can sometimes be related to the myth of human exceptionalism. But, assuming for a moment that queer is the opposite of straight, queer may necessarily mean undisciplined, in a way. It takes a great deal of discipline, in my opinion, to limit oneself to only that which is straight. To me, it would be a great and difficult sacrifice. Perhaps 'queer,' in an undisciplined sense, means that one is at least partly clear of the shame that keeps one locked into only that which is familiar to others and hegemonic. Of course, as queer theory is a part of academia, one could easily question whether it is really undisciplined, and how unfamiliar it is when it is in an institutionalized format. And certainly, even 'bad' queer groups can form their own social elitism that establishes standards and disciplines.
More than anything else this semester, tracking my term, youth, has been the main thing that has convinced me that my ideal of queer can and does exist, and also that queer does often mean (but perhaps not always) undisciplined. In the introduction to Curiouser, the authors assert that children and the stories they tell and enact about themselves are very queer indeed and that children's innocence is the product of adult narrative superimposed over that of children's. I found this assertion a powerful and encouraging one because I have long grappled with the question of honoring children's wishes which I see as reasonable over those of their parents which I see as phobic of all things "not normal" in questions of child care work. If a child's parents want their two year old to keep their clothes on at all times when not in the bath, and I let the child run around naked (babies love to run around naked) and the parents arrive home early, I could be reprimanded for not helping the child "learn to be decent" and all manner of concerns about that child's "exposure" of themselves surface (especially in my cousin's over-anxious household whom I provide child care for). Certainly, whatever benefits there are to wearing clothes in this part of the world (staying warm), the lack of those benefits were not what my cousin was concerned about. She wasn't really even worried about the child's ability to socialize well (for all that's worth). She was most concerned about her child becoming, as she said, a complete pervert. I must admit, she's a particularly hyper-tense mother. When her toddler hits his teddy bear she thinks it is a warning sign he will become a serial killer. But I have heard similar concerns come from the mouths of other parents, who seem not to be thinking about how strange it must be for their child to put rough clothes around their soft baby skin, not seeing the need for it on a warm summers day (especially those awful jeans parents put babies in). Their concerns are not really about their children or shaping a society that fits the needs of their children and other people, but people fitting the needs of society and disciplining children to bear the weight of those scruffy clothes. Children are silenced because they remind us of that which is queer in all of us, because their contributions to society are too creative and non-normative to reproduce it properly.

I think the definition of “queer” that makes the most sense to me goes along the line(s) of an action, identity, or something else that is enacted solely through the vein of personal desire; it would have to be that thing or state of being that is bred out of no relation to outward influences or forces. Queer is not reactionary, it is not influenced, it is something created out of raw desire and nothing else.

I don't think there is any necessary relationship between queer and being disciplined or undisciplined, and the frequent association of queer with being undisciplined is just as preposterous as any other association, to me. I think queer can be the same as something that is disciplined just as often as it can be the same as something that is undisciplined as long as it is always raw and inconsiderate. Now, I realize this is splitting hairs, because one could posit that raw, inconsiderate desire is practically impossible in a society where we are so associated and connected to other individuals and institutions, but I can't imagine getting into that discussion now. Nonetheless, to me, being in a straight marriage with 2.5 kids, a house, and a white picket fence could be just as queer as changing your sex six times as long as it's bred out of a raw personal desire to do those things.

Hopefully that makes sense?

My definition of queer is simple and broad. I believe queer to be anythng that is not defined by the majority who reside in our society as "normal". It is basically anything that few do or that few admit to doing. My definition of queer can be used as an identity or an action so long as it is being used to describe something that is perceived as uncommon or taboo in a sense. If the general public does it on a continual basis and admits to doing it, it is not queer, if the opposit is true however, it is queer.
I would say that when something is queer it is considered to be undisciplined in our society. To me, to be disciplined means to be broken down in a way. To have been changed in some way from behaving or being something undesirable and then changed into something more desirable. Since in our society what is undesirable is to be "un-normal" or queer, I view discipline to be the correction of something that was queer. Therefore, I do not believe that something can really be queer and disciplined at the same time, for the same reason, because to be one of those terms means to not be the other.

Queer is the ability to rest in the gray area, the margin, the in between, the borderland and be okay with it. I think that is how the other comments are explaining it as well but in different ways.

Keagan is talking about a place of raw desire to do things. As I understand, it is more about the motive than the action. And anonymous is saying that queer is about doing the opposite of the norm or the whole or maybe even going against the status quo. Either definition is lending itself to life of hardship, lack of acceptance, oppression and being outcasts. Queer is stagnant, it does just rest in one place. It is constantly moving and alluding all who try to find it. I mean, I don't think one goes out and searches for being queer or queer things. One becomes it and in the becoming realizes the queerness of it all...or maybe not.

This question of what is queer, or how do we define queer has actually been pretty elusive to me. It's been putting my head in a spin similar to the what is "outside" the universe question, until recently. Queer, as a verb, as we discussed earlier in the semester is interesting, but for me doesn't quite get to the meaning. I agree with Katie in thinking of Queer as unfixed and like an assemblage. Puar wrote, "Queerness as an assemblage moves away from excavation work, deprivileges a binary opposition between queer and not-queer subjects, and, instead of retaining queer as dissenting, resistant, ad alternative ( all of which queerness importantly is and does), it underscores contingency and complicity with dominant formations." That is to say, queer is complicated. While I would like for queer to be the stylized site of resistance, always oppositional to oppressive norms, it is often more problematic than that.

Queer is anything that does not fit into the matrix of heteronormativity and does not live on the polarity of male/female, feminine/masculine, vanilla & opposite sexual desires and practice. It challenges the very 'foundation' of this accepted existence and acts as the umbrella to a huge variety of identities outside of it.

Those who are queer are rejected as undisciplined members of society and somehow fell out of the traditional formation of a community member. They become outcast from the mainstream and find that they must create their own unruly culture to find others who share a particular queerness and give meaning to their new identities.

I feel like I am merely repeating what it is that others have already said pertaining to the broadness of queer existence, but it seems to be the exact example I am looking for in terms of people coming together to form a new identity that does not conform to heteronormative pracitices and acceptances. Conformity is only an option, individuality is a possibility.


Queer is somewhere in between and outside of these two queer images [potentially homo(does that say mono?)normative masculinity costumed for marriage and a "souvenir" of morbidly erotic uh... leafy genital coverings, and such]. Andi, we're going to need your German skills to figure out what's happening in the all-mannequin set from the above photographer.


a correction to my earlier comment. I meant to say queer is not stagnant, it doesn't just rest in one place.... not what I did say! :-)

I see queering as looking at the world through the lens of queer. Queering is looking at things in our society and our world that seem to be the unchallenged status quo and turning it inside out. This is uncomfortable for many who are comfortable with the status quo. So necessarily queering makes many people uncomfortable, creates fear in them. Because queering does these things without apology, queering is a fearless action. Queering is appropriating the things that have been perverted into the norm and asking why and how that is. Queer is also looking at things that are already queer and naming that queerness in the subject, like with the queerness of the child. Also, with the queerness of terrorists in Puar's writing, I think it became even more clear to me that queering doesn't have boundaries, that is part of the fearlessness of queering as an action. Queering can be turned on a gender-defining book or advertisement and at the same time queering can be used to interpret the meaning behind suicide bombers. This agility to move to the murky spaces that exist outside of the comfortable reaches of mainstream society is its unique quality.