Queer Communication Pedagogy

241 Pages·2019·6.809 MB·English

by  Ahmet Atay (editor), Sandra L. Pensoneau-Conway (editor)

Queer Communication Pedagogy
This book addresses queer issues and current events from a communica-
tion perspective to articulate a queer communication pedagogy. Through
putting communication pedagogy and queer studies into dialogue, the
book investigates how queer theory and critical communication peda-
gogy intersect in pedagogical spaces.
The chapters identify institutional and educational barriers, oppres-
sions, and issues pertaining to queer lives in the context of higher edu-
cation. Using a variety of critical methodological approaches (including
dialogic methods, autoethnography, performative writing, and visual
methods), each chapter theorizes a queer communication pedagogy,
and offers a path toward and innovative ideas about materializing queer
communication pedagogy as a disciplinary endeavor.
This book will be of interest to scholars, graduate students, and upper-
level undergraduate students in Communication Studies, Critical Com-
munication Pedagogy, Intercultural Communication, Higher Education,
Public Pedagogy, Queer Studies, and Critical/Cultural Studies.
Ahmet Atay (Ph.D. Southern Illinois University Carbondale) is an Associ-
ate Professor of Communication at the College of Wooster. His research
revolves around cultural studies, media studies, and critical intercultural
communication. In particular, he focuses on diasporic experiences and cul-
tural identity formations of diasporic individuals; political and social com-
plexities of city life, such as immigrant and queer experiences; the usage
of new media technologies in different settings; and the notion of home.
He is the author of Globalization’s Impact on Identity Formation: Queer
Diasporic Males in Cyberspace (2015) and the co-editor of nine books. His
scholarship has appeared in number of journals and edited books.
Sandra L. Pensoneau-Conway (Ph.D. Southern Illinois University Car-
bondale) is an Associate Professor of Communication Studies at South-
ern Illinois University, Carbondale. Her teaching and research interests
include critical communication pedagogy, communication and iden-
tity, and automethods. Recent publications include a co-edited book
Doing Autoethnography; a co-edited special issue of Communication
Teacher (critical communication pedagogy); essays in QED: A Journal
of GLBTQ Worldmaking, and Critical Education; and a chapter in The
Discourse of Disability in Higher Education.
Routledge Research in Communication Studies
Populist Political Communication in Europe
Edited by Toril Aalberg, Frank Esser, Carsten Reinemann,
Jesper Strömbäck, and Claes H. de Vreese
Setting Agendas in Cultural Markets
Organizations, Creators, Experiences
Philemon Bantimaroudis
Communication, Advocacy, and Work/Family Balance
Jenny Dixon
Integrative Framing Analysis
Framing Health through Words and Visuals
Viorela Dan
The Discourse of Special Populations
Critical Intercultural Communication Pedagogy and Practice
Edited by Ahmet Atay and Diana Trebing
Interrogating the Communicative Power of Whiteness
Edited by Dawn Marie D. McIntosh, Dreama G. Moon, and
Thomas K. Nakayama
Media in War and Armed Conflict
The Dynamics of Conflict News Production and Dissemination
Edited by Romy Fröhlich
Mediated Intercultural Communication in a Digital Age
Edited by Ahmet Atay and Margaret D’Silva
Queer Communication Pedagogy
Edited by Ahmet Atay and Sandra L. Pensoneau-Conway
Queer Communication
Pedagogy
Edited by
Ahmet Atay and
Sandra L. Pensoneau-Conway
First published 2020
by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
and by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group,
an informa business
© 2020 selection and editorial matter, Ahmet Atay and
Sandra L. Pensoneau-Conway; individual chapters,
the contributors
The right of Ahmet Atay and Sandra L. Pensoneau-Conway
to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of
the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in
accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs
and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted
or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be
trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for
identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this title has been requested
ISBN: 978-1-138-06644-1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-15916-4 (ebk)
Typeset in Sabon
by codeMantra
Contents
List of Contributors vii
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction: Queering Communication Pedagogy 1
AHMET ATAY AND SANDRA L. PENSONEAU-CONWAY
PART I
Theorizing Queer Communication Pedagogies 15
1 Queer Pedagogy: Story of a Course 17
KAREN E. LOVAAS AND MERCILEE M. JENKINS
2 Bi and Bi: Exploring the Transgressive Potential of the
Bisexual-Biracial Identity in the Queer Classroom 44
STEPHANIE L. YOUNG
3 Disrupting Public Pedagogies of Bisexuality 62
JESSICA A. JOHNSON AND BERNADETTE MARIE CALAFELL
4 Celebration, Resistance, and Change: Queer Gender
Performers of Color as Public Pedagogues 73
KRISHNA PATTISAPU
5 Transnational Queer Communication Pedagogy 92
AHMET ATAY
vi Contents
PART 2
Queering Classroom 105
6 Transing Communication Education: A Chorus of Voices 107
JAMIE C. CAPUZZA, LELAND G. SPENCER, THOMAS J.
BILLARD, E. TRISTAN BOOTH, MATTHEW HEINZ,
SARAH JONES, AND LUCY MILLER
7 Creative Practice as Queer Media Pedagogy 130
KATHERINE SENDER
8 The Queer Act of Talking Sex: Pedagogical Challenges in
a Communication Course on Pornography 157
ANDREW R. SPIELDENNER AND JAHNASIA J. BOOKER
9 Fostering an Emerging Queer Consciousness 172
BENNY LeMASTER
10 Hesitant to Walk: Affective Interventions in Queer
Communication Pedagogy 191
KATHRYN HOBSON
11 Disclosing Lives, Reading Bodies: A Duo-
autoethnography of Queerness in the Classroom 209
COLIN WHITWORTH AND ANNA WILCOXEN
Index 225
Contributors
Thomas J. Billard (M.A., University of Southern California) is a Ph.D.
candidate in the University of Southern California’s Annenberg
School for Communication and Journalism. He is a political commu-
nication scholar whose research focuses on transgender politics and
graphic design. His research has been published in the International
Journal of Communication; Media, Culture & Society; Journalism
& Mass Communication Quarterly;  Mass Communication and
Society; Communication Research Reports; Politics, Groups, and
Identities; Frontiers in Psychology; and Marketing Theory, as well as
several edited volumes.
Jahnasia J. Booker is a Ph.D. student at Louisiana State University
studying Performance Studies. As an artivist (activist + artist), ad-
vocate, and academic, her work revolves around performance, art,
gender studies, Black and African American studies, and cultural
studies. Specifically, Jahnasia uses ethnographic performance to ex-
plore Black womanhood and produces and curates cultural projects
such as fashion shows, an indie documentary, and exhibitions.
E. Tristan Booth (Ph.D., Arizona State University) is an instructor in
the Hugh Downs School of Human Communication, Arizona State
University, with an academic emphasis in rhetoric, focusing on the
rhetorical strategies of individuals whose social identities are mar-
ginalized in society, particularly those relating to gender, sex, and
sexuality. His scholarship has examined the rhetorical strategies em-
ployed by transsexual gay men as they navigate medical protocols, the
conceptualization of the term man in 20th- and 21st-century United
States discourse, the corporeal strategies of transmen in public re-
strooms, the representation of transsexuals in television documentary
series, and the tension between stable identity constructs and liminal
social identities in an episode of the original series of Queer Eye for
the Straight Guy that featured a transsexual man. His work has been
published in Communication Studies, Western Journal of Commu-
nication, and the book Transgender Communication Studies: Histo-
ries, Trends, and Trajectories.
viii Contributors
Bernadette Marie Calafell (Ph.D., University of North Carolina) is a Pro-
fessor and the inaugural Chair in the Department of Critical Race and
Ethnic Studies at Gonzaga University. She is the author of Latina/o
Communication Studies: Theorizing Performance and Monstrosity,
Performance, and Race in Contemporary Culture and a co-editor of
Latina/o Discourse in Vernacular Spaces: Somos de Una Voz? She
was the recipient of the Lilla A. Heston Award for Outstanding Schol-
arship in Interpretation and Performance Studies from the National
Communication Association (NCA); the Córdova-Puchot Award for
Scholar of the Year from the Latina/o Communication Studies Divi-
sion and La Raza Caucus of NCA; the Lambda Award from the Cau-
cus for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Queer Concerns of NCA; and the
Francine Merritt Award from the Women’s Caucus of NCA.
Jamie C. Capuzza (Ph.D., The Ohio State University) is a Professor in the
Department of Communication at the University of Mount Union.
Her work has appeared in academic journals such as Communica-
tion Quarterly, The International Journal of Transgenderism, The
Newspaper Research Journal, and Communication Education. Her
book, co-edited with Dr. Leland Spencer, Transgender Communica-
tion Studies: Histories, Trends, and Trajectories, won the National
Communication Association LBGTQ Division’s Top Book award in
2017 and the Applied Communication Division’s Distinguished Ed-
ited Book award in 2016 as well as the Organization for the Study
of Communication, Language and Gender Top Edited Book award
in 2016. Capuzza was named Gender Scholar of the Year in 2018 by
the Southern States Communication Association, and she received
the University of Mount Union’s Distinguished Research Award
in 2019.
matthew heinz (Ph.D. University of Nebraska) is a Vice-Provost of
Graduate and Interdisciplinary Studies, the Dean of the College of
Interdisciplinary Studies, and a Professor in the School of Commu-
nication and Culture at Royal Roads University in Victoria, British
Columbia. Royal Roads University is located on the traditional lands
of the Xwsepsum (Esquimalt) and Lkwungen (Songhees) families. His
scholarly work focuses on the intersections of language, gender, iden-
tity, and culture. He examines intercultural and international com-
munication via poetry, performative writing, qualitative studies, and
discourse analysis. He led a community-guided transgender needs
assessment for Vancouver Island in 2013. heinz’s work has appeared
in SAGE Open, The Journal of Pragmatics, Multilingua, Commu-
nication Teacher, Communication Education, The Journal of Inter-
national Communication, Communication Studies, the Journal of
Cognition and Communication, and other peer-reviewed journals
and books. He published Entering Transmasculinity: The Inevitabil-
ity of Discourse (Intellect Press, UK) in 2016.
Contributors ix
Kathryn Hobson holds an M.A. and Ph.D. in Communication Studies
from the University of Denver. She is an Assistant Professor in the
School of Communication at James Madison University and Affiliate
Faculty in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. Her research fo-
cuses on critical intercultural communication, queer and feminist per-
formance, and arts-based qualitative methods. She primarily teaches
courses in Cultural Communication, like Intercultural Communi-
cation, Ethnographic Approaches to Communication, and Critical
Sexuality and Communication. She is committed to creating “Safer”
spaces for folks of difference to gather and build community, foster
mentoring relationships, and co-create areas of empowered learning.
Mercilee M. Jenkins (Ph.D. University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana)
is Professor Emerita of Communication Studies at San Francisco
State University. Her teaching, research, and creative interests com-
bine sexuality and gender, performance studies, and ethnographic
methods. She co-edited a collection of essays, Sexualities and Com-
munication in Everyday Life with Karen Lovaas as well as wrote
many other articles and book chapters on related subjects. She is best
known for her plays and solo performance pieces addressing social
issues including “Winning” published in The Best American Shorts
Plays 2014–2015, Spirit of Detroit reviewed in Text and Performance
Quarterly (2015), and Home on Norfolk Road excerpted as “Burn-
ing Down the House” in Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies
(2014). Recently produced plays include 50 Love Letters and Apoc-
alypse Now or Maybe Later. She is currently working on a novel
entitled A Safe Distance from Home.
Jessica Johnson (Ph.D., University of Denver) is an Adjunct Instructor of
Communication Studies at Metropolitan State University and Front
Range Community College. She is also an Office of International-
ization Adjunct at the University of Denver. Her research focuses on
Transnational Feminist Health Rhetoric. Specifically, she focuses on
how the U.S. spreads coloniality when collaborating in sexual health
campaigns. Since she began her academic career she has worked to
establish a research agenda that critically examines health disparities
among historically marginalized groups. Activism is a big part of her
life as she is the chair of the Graduate Women’s Council and member
of the Social Justice and Solidarity group at the University of Denver.
Sarah Jones (Ph.D., Arizona State University) is an Assistant Professor
of Organizational Communication at Ohio University. She studies the
power and politics of gender in organizations—how gendered orga-
nizing creates subjectivities, polices behavior, and affects access to
resources across communities. Her current research explores alterna-
tive organizing, unintentional membership, and corporeal commod-
ification in the milk banking industry, for which she earned a Top