The present essay claims for a reconsideration of the role played by ‘queer’ and the field of queer studies in the Italian context of Cultural and Literary Studies. While looking at the wider social and cultural phenomenon of Italian «belatedness» (but signalling in the meantime some fine examples of ready Italian responses to emerging queer issues, as displayed by the fields of Anglo-American Studies and cultural geography), my analysis seeks to envisage the signs of a first encounter between the production of a queer theory, mainly located in the United States, and the reception by Italian literary theory and criticism. It is a story of misunderstandings, missing points, incomplete allusions, overarched by a broader sense of disbelief at a critical activity which often presents us with personal implications and agit-prop positions – thus being seen as peripheral to the accepted critical protocols. To overcome this ongoing situation, in the final paragraph I suggest to underline and incentivize some already existing thematics and traditions in cultural-anthropological perspectives on literary study, in order to fill the gap between our usual academic practices and an updated, worldly and effective, definition of Humanities.

Cartoline dalla penombra. Studi letterari, studi culturali, studi queer

IACOLI, GIULIO
2012-01-01

Abstract

The present essay claims for a reconsideration of the role played by ‘queer’ and the field of queer studies in the Italian context of Cultural and Literary Studies. While looking at the wider social and cultural phenomenon of Italian «belatedness» (but signalling in the meantime some fine examples of ready Italian responses to emerging queer issues, as displayed by the fields of Anglo-American Studies and cultural geography), my analysis seeks to envisage the signs of a first encounter between the production of a queer theory, mainly located in the United States, and the reception by Italian literary theory and criticism. It is a story of misunderstandings, missing points, incomplete allusions, overarched by a broader sense of disbelief at a critical activity which often presents us with personal implications and agit-prop positions – thus being seen as peripheral to the accepted critical protocols. To overcome this ongoing situation, in the final paragraph I suggest to underline and incentivize some already existing thematics and traditions in cultural-anthropological perspectives on literary study, in order to fill the gap between our usual academic practices and an updated, worldly and effective, definition of Humanities.
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11584/77222
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