Writing and reading queerly: Foucault’s aesthetics of existence and queer self-making
Article
Article Title | Writing and reading queerly: Foucault’s aesthetics of existence and queer self-making |
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ERA Journal ID | 35836 |
Article Category | Article |
Authors | |
Author | Baker, Dallas J. |
Journal Title | TEXT: Journal of Writing and Writing Courses |
Journal Citation | 19 (Special Issue 31), pp. 1-14 |
Number of Pages | 14 |
Year | 2015 |
Publisher | Australasian Association of Writing Programs |
Place of Publication | Australia |
ISSN | 1327-9556 |
Digital Object Identifier (DOI) | https://doi.org/10.52086/001c.27167 |
Web Address (URL) | http://www.textjournal.com.au/speciss/issue31/Baker.pdf |
Abstract | Michel Foucault advocated an ongoing assembly and disassembly of subjectivity that constituted a kind of self-bricolage; a making and re-making of subjectivity that he saw as an aesthetic struggle towards an artistic ideal. Foucault described this process as an ethics of the self. The purpose of this transformative self-bricolage is to make philosophy a ‘way of life’. One of the examples Foucault gave of a technique used in such an ethics of the self – implemented to produce a desired or altered/transformed subject – was reflective writing. This article explores the ways that writing informed by Queer Theory can be used as a technique in a Foucauldian ethics of the self, especially within the context of the teacher-student relationship in the discipline of creative writing. It further argues that creative writing is an appropriate site for ‘ethical interventions’ into subjectivity and for explorations into how philosophy, in this case Queer Theory, can be applied as a way of life in which new forms of subjectivity are explored and produced. Furthermore, the paper discusses the way that queer readings of literary texts can also be part of an ethics of the self or queer self-making. |
Keywords | creative writing; queer writing; ethics of the self; Michel Foucault; self-making |
ANZSRC Field of Research 2020 | 360201. Creative writing (incl. scriptwriting) |
Public Notes | File reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher/author. |
Byline Affiliations | School of Arts and Communication |
Institution of Origin | University of Southern Queensland |
https://research.usq.edu.au/item/q3235/writing-and-reading-queerly-foucault-s-aesthetics-of-existence-and-queer-self-making
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