This book explores how phenomenological ideas about embodiment, perception, and lived experience are discussed within disability studies, critical race theory, and queer studies. Building on these disciplines, it offers readings of memoirs and novels that address the consequences of stigmatization and the bodily dimensions of social differences. The texts include Robert F. Murphys The Body Silent, Simi Lintons My Body Politic, Rod Michalkos The Two-in-One: Walking with Smokie, Walking with Blindness, three memoirs by Stephen Kuusisto, Vincent O. Carters The Bern Book, as well as two novels, Matthew Griffins Hide and Armistead Maupins Maybe the Moon. All of the texts discussed in this book negotiate the significance of bodily and perceptual habits, the influence of language and culture on embodiment, the importance of relationality and community, the severe effects of misrecognition, and the possibilities of emancipation and social recognition. Hence, they are read as pioneering contributions to the emerging field of critical phenomenology. Simon Dickel is Professor of Gender and Diversity Studies at Folkwang University of the Arts in Essen, Germany. He is the author of Black/Gay: The Harlem Renaissance, the Protest Era, and Constructions of Black Gay Identity in the 1980s and 90s (2011).
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.