Queer Kinship in Sarah Schulman’s AIDS Novels

Download or read book Queer Kinship in Sarah Schulman’s AIDS Novels written by Jarosław Milewski and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-02-29 with total page 140 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Queer Kinship in Sarah Schulman’s AIDS Novels is the first book to extensively discuss the works of Sarah Schulman, a journalist, activist and globally recognized novelist. This research monograph juxtaposes the works about the AIDS epidemic which were well-received by the mainstream America with Schulman’s own output as a “bard of AIDS burnout,” in the words of Edmund White. In contrast with the prevailing representations of the epidemic, her works emphasize the importance of queer kinship, chosen families and AIDS activist groups that fall outside of the heteronorm. Bearing witness to these voluntary collectivities means also surviving the traumatizing experience of ongoing, repeated death and refusing the idea of an easy solution to the crisis. The monograph tracks the tension between the dominant narratives about the epidemic and those articulated from the excluded positions, arguing that Schulman reformulates queer kinship as the locus of social change.