This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Fraser, S. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Poetic World-Making: Queer as Folk, Counterpublic Speech and the ‘Reader’

University of NSW, Australia, suzanne.fraser{at}unsw.edu.au

The television programme Queer as Folk depicts both scandalous, indecorous behaviour, and respectable, even conventional, forms of love. It constitutes what Michael Warner, in his influential essay ‘Publics and Counterpublics’, has described as public speech and, at the same time, it sits both inside and outside his category of counterpublic speech. As such, it operates as a boundary case through which the distinction between public and counterpublic can be analysed. In this article, this analysis is conducted both as a means of building upon Warner’s theory, and to offer insights into the ways in which young gay male viewers in Sydney, Australia watch the programme and, linked to this, how they understand sexuality in relation to transformational politics. In the process, the article troubles Warner’s distinguishing of counterpublic from public by investigating the rather neglected question of the ‘reader’ in his designations of the counterpublic.

Key Words: gay men • Michael Warner • public discourse • Queer as Folk • reading • television

Sexualities, Vol. 9, No. 2, 152-170 (2006)
DOI: 10.1177/1363460706063117


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?