Queer Kinship in Sarah Schulman’s AIDS Novels is the first book to extensively discuss the works of Sarah Schulman, a journalist, activist and globally recognized novelist. This research monograph juxtaposes the works about the AIDS epidemic which were well-received by the mainstream America with Schulman’s own output as a “bard of AIDS burnout,” in the words of Edmund White. In contrast with the prevailing representations of the epidemic, her works emphasize the importance of queer kinship, chosen families and AIDS activist groups that fall outside of the heteronorm. Bearing witness to these voluntary collectivities means also surviving the traumatizing experience of ongoing, repeated death and refusing the idea of an easy solution to the crisis. The monograph tracks the tension between the dominant narratives about the epidemic and those articulated from the excluded positions, arguing that Schulman reformulates queer kinship as the locus of social change.
Introduction
Queer Kinship and the Culture Industry
Biopolitics of The Culture Industry
Sex and Kinship
The Scapegoating of Patient O
Thicker Than Blood
Monogamy as a Cure
A Simulacrum of Diversity
A Lifetime of Resistance
Activists and Bohemians
Forgetful Bohemians
Meaningful Kinship
Acting up for Justice
Witnessing Among Rats
“Familial Homophobia…”
“…and Its Consequences”
Unbearable Witnessing
No Country for the Rats
Towards Queer Kinship
Queer Fractures
One of Us
The Normal Love
Conclusion
Biography
Jarosław Milewski holds a PhD in Literature from the University of Łódź, where he currently works as a teaching assistant at the Department of American Literature. He is also an editorial secretary of InterAlia: A Journal of Queer Studies.
