Presenter: Zoey Kourianos
Authors: Zoey Kourianos
Faculty Advisor: Connie Etter
Institution: Westminster College
I center the research on the “Am I a Lesbian? MasterDoc,” a viral document outlining an essentialized lesbian identity, as a means for understanding the role of public pedagogy (Giroux, 2004) in compelling individuals to acquire and claim an intelligible sexuality. Though useful in mobilizing community through the adoption of a shared identity, the rendering of an intelligible sexuality is simultaneously implicated in the broader historical context of distinguishing ‘the homosexual’ from ‘the heterosexual’ in scientific terms. This distinction symbolizes an effort to invent the normality of heterosexuality and reinforce the power of the heterosexual male (Weeks, 2013). While providing specific and relevant analysis of digital space and the social construction of lesbian identity, my methodology is designed with an open-ended interview approach to create a space for dialogue and critical consciousness in Freire’s (1970) sense: a space where one may come to name the world for oneself rather than through pre-existing categories. In interviews, participants imagine how queer identity and community may come to deconstruct hegemonic conceptions of sexuality. Drawing on Weeks’ (1977) notion of the homosexual consciousness, the content of the “Am I a Lesbian? MasterDoc” anchors dialogues between researcher and participant as a site of public pedagogy wherein appeals to the lesbian consciousness are made in explicit terms. My analysis of these interviews considers the tension between the desire of the individual to belong to broader queer community and the imperative to name the sexual self as a mode of oppression. My findings indicate how imperatives to speak and know sexuality become dominant in digital space through appeals to heteronormative ideals of palatable sexuality. In considering how interview participants refuse such ideals, I propose an expansive conception of lesbian identity so as to resist disembodied and decontextualized framings of the sexual self.