Open AccessQueer Emergencies, 5.26.2017
Author(s) -
Colin Whitworth
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
art/research international
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2371-3771
DOI - 10.18432/ari29331
Subject(s) - queer , poetry , articulation (sociology) , subjectivity , politics , identity (music) , aesthetics , temporality , sociology , art , literature , gender studies , law , philosophy , political science , epistemology
Hal Foster (2015) asserts that art should address emergencies. While he speaks of visual and performance arts, I extend his claim to poetry. As such, I use my positionality of queer individual as an entrance point to using poetry to address queer emergencies. Starting with Hegel’s (1975) articulation that the lyric form of poetry starts with our own subjectivity and shows a “coming to consciousness” (Culler, 2015, p. 2) through thought and reflection, this poetry addresses a pressing queer emergency of our current political moment (Chechnya), while also extending its reach to/through the intersections with other queer emergencies of today’s climate. Through this inscription of the present, I strive to illuminate the personhood of queer victims, the intersections of current queer emergencies, and the temporal and real proximity of emergency to those of us who might feel safe based on other identity intersections.