Return of Munoz!

Note: this discussion of an essay entitled “Ghosts of Public Sex” contains brief descriptions of public sex. Also ghosts. Also a pandemic, but not Covid: AIDS.

This is part two of my readthrough of Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity, by José Esteban Muñoz.

(I didn’t forget or abandon this project! I even had the chapter read well in advance. However, once again neglecting to use the study skills I teach every day, I did not budget enough time to do the actual writing. This is a humbling experience in which my empathy for students only grows. If nothing else, this process will be useful in that respect.)

( This week I’m looking at Chapter 2 )

It's funny how our reading converges. After I wrote up Chapter 1, I happened to pick up Ursula K. LeGuin's book of essays, Dancing on the Edge of the World (1989). I flipped to, and read, "A Non-Euclidean View of California as a Cold Place to Be," which turns out to be about the function of art in creating a vision of utopia, very much in alignment with Muñoz's thinking (and quite close in time.)

Dancing was actually on my "Maybe give this away?" shelf. Now I don't know.

{rf}