Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick
Overview
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick was an American
academic scholar in the fields of gender studies
, queer theory
(queer studies
), and critical theory
. Her critical writings helped create the field of queer studies. Her works reflect an interest in a range of issues, including queer performativity
; experimental critical writing; the works of Marcel Proust
; non-Lacanian psychoanalysis
; artists' books; Buddhism
and pedagogy
; the affective theories of Silvan Tomkins
and Melanie Klein
; and material culture, especially textiles and texture.
Drawing on feminist scholarship and the work of Michel Foucault
, Sedgwick uncovered what she claimed were concealed homoerotic subplots in writers like Charles Dickens
and Henry James
.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
academic scholar in the fields of gender studies
Gender studies
Gender studies is a field of interdisciplinary study which analyses race, ethnicity, sexuality and location.Gender study has many different forms. One view exposed by the philosopher Simone de Beauvoir said: "One is not born a woman, one becomes one"...
, queer theory
Queer theory
Queer theory is a field of critical theory that emerged in the early 1990s out of the fields of LGBT studies and feminist studies. Queer theory includes both queer readings of texts and the theorisation of 'queerness' itself...
(queer studies
Queer studies
Queer studies is the critical theory based study of issues relating to sexual orientation and gender identity usually focusing on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people and cultures. Universities have also labeled this area of analysis Sexual Diversity Studies, Sexualities...
), and critical theory
Critical theory
Critical theory is an examination and critique of society and culture, drawing from knowledge across the social sciences and humanities. The term has two different meanings with different origins and histories: one originating in sociology and the other in literary criticism...
. Her critical writings helped create the field of queer studies. Her works reflect an interest in a range of issues, including queer performativity
Performativity
Performativity is an interdisciplinary term often used to name the capacity of speech and language in particular, as well as other non-verbal forms of expressive action, to intervene in the course of human events. The term derives from the work in speech act theory originated by the analytic...
; experimental critical writing; the works of Marcel Proust
Marcel Proust
Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...
; non-Lacanian psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is a psychological theory developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud. Psychoanalysis has expanded, been criticized and developed in different directions, mostly by some of Freud's former students, such as Alfred Adler and Carl Gustav...
; artists' books; Buddhism
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
and pedagogy
Pedagogy
Pedagogy is the study of being a teacher or the process of teaching. The term generally refers to strategies of instruction, or a style of instruction....
; the affective theories of Silvan Tomkins
Silvan Tomkins
Silvan Solomon Tomkins is best known as a psychologist and personality theorist and as the developer of Affect theory and Script theory...
and Melanie Klein
Melanie Klein
Melanie Reizes Klein was an Austrian-born British psychoanalyst who devised novel therapeutic techniques for children that had an impact on child psychology and contemporary psychoanalysis...
; and material culture, especially textiles and texture.
Drawing on feminist scholarship and the work of Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault , born Paul-Michel Foucault , was a French philosopher, social theorist and historian of ideas...
, Sedgwick uncovered what she claimed were concealed homoerotic subplots in writers like Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
and Henry James
Henry James
Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....
.
Quotations
I've heard of many people who claim they'd as soon their children were dead as gay. What it took me a long time to believe is that these people are saying no more than the truth. They even speak for others too delicate to use the cruel words.
Tendencies (Duke University Press, 1993), p. 2
Seemingly, this society wants its children to know nothing; wants its queer children to conform or (and this is not a figure of speech) die; and wants not to know that it is getting what it wants.
Tendencies (Duke University Press, 1993), p. 3
One of the things that 'queer' can refer to: the open mesh of possibilities, gaps, overlaps, dissonances and resonances, lapses and excesses of meaning when the constituent elements of anyone's gender, of anyone's sexuality aren't made (or can't be made) to signify monolithically.
Tendencies (Duke University Press, 1993), p. 8