Date of Award

2021

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Organizational Unit

College of Arts Humanities and Social Sciences, Communication Studies

First Advisor

Santhosh Chandrashekar

Second Advisor

Bernadette M. Calafell

Third Advisor

Erin K. Willer

Fourth Advisor

Frédérique Chevillot

Keywords

Fat studies, Intersectionality, Performance studies, Pop culture, Queer failure, Queer temporality

Abstract

Failure and fat are not linear. It is taught, learned, reminded, and internalized. Our bodies have memories that are built through repeated moments. And for me, failure has been a part of my body’s map since I was born. This project is the culmination of many failures. In this dissertation, I am examining queer failure in multiple contexts including body size, as well as religion to create a corpulent critique. I do this by examining the lineage of queer failure as well as queer temporality as it is linked to failure (Edelman; Muñoz; Halberstam; Love) with fat queer bodies serving as foundational elements. Informed by LeMaster, I understand queer failure in the context of fatness as being imbued with a potentiality for creation. In addition, Love frames my queer temporal understanding of fatness as “looking behind” even as one traverses the linearity of straight time (5). In doing this, I connect the ways in which queer and fat temporalities often exist as failures when juxtaposed to heteronormative and normative-body- size temporalities. By using critical autoethnography and cultural critique, I demonstrate the way in which my body is implicated in always-being-too-much and never-being-enough. By weaving together my stories with Lilith and Ursula, I examine how fatness and failure create a new branch of queer failure that examines how they are linked in a way that provides possibilities for revolution instead of despair.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Miranda Dottie Olzman

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Format

application/pdf

Language

en

File Size

129 pgs

Discipline

Communication, Women's studies, Gender studies

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