"didja know about this thing called queer theory?"
One of the fellows in my little posse said that to me tonight. My answer, of course, was "yes..." while my inner monologue was saying "oh, this could go very badly very quickly." See, the fellow is a 57-year-old conservative Republican ex-Navy man.
So I say "yes..." and he says "and I learned about this thing in 1969..."
Me: "
Stonewall?"
Him: "Yes! That's the one. Didn't know about that. And I learned that there are entire different groups of people that read things differently than I do."
Me: (still waiting to be told I'm going to hell or some such) "Yeah..."
Him: "My whole brain went 'whoa!' [puts hands to head and makes gesture akin to 'mind-blowing']"
It was SO CUTE.
See, his LitCrit class just got to chapter ten of Lois Tyson's
Critical Theory Today, which is "Lesbian, Gay and Queer Criticism." He showed me all the things he dutifully highlighted in
The Great Gatsby, and I informed him that I've always been a bad queer, because nine times out of ten I think that the elevator lever is
just an elevator lever. He laughed. Then we talked about the
multiverse, which has nothing to do with literature, and how stoked we all are that one of our favorite profs is teaching the materials & methods class next semester. It'll be a fun/interesting next couple of years with these folks. I like 'em.
