The Queer Politics of Television

by Chambers, Samuel A.

• ISBN13: 9781845116811
• ISBN10: 184511681X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-08-15
• Publisher: I. B. Tauris

Summary

This is a radical book, which brings together the fields of political theory and television studies. In one of the first books to do so, Samuel A. Chambers exposes and explores the cultural politics of television by treating television shows-including Six Feet Under , Buffy , Desperate Housewives , The L Word, and Big Love- as serious, important texts and reading them in detail through the lens of queer theory. Samuel A. Chambers makes the case for the profound significance of "the cultural politics of television," the way in which a television show's text itself engages with the politics of its day. He argues for queer theory's essential contribution to any understanding of the political, and initiates a larger project of queer television studies. This is an important and fresh contribution to queer theory and to the understanding of television as politics.

Author Biography

Samuel A. Chambers teaches political theory at Johns Hopkins University. He writes broadly in political theory, including work on language, culture, and the politics of gender and sexuality.  He is co-author, with Terrell Carver, of Judith Butler and Political Theory (2008).  He has also edited with Terrell Carver three recent volumes, Carole Pateman: Feminism, Democracy, Welfare (2009),  Judith Butler's Precarious Politics (2008) and William Connolly: Democracy, Pluralism, and Political Theory (2007).

Table of Contents

* Preface * Introduction * Queer Theory and the Cultural Politics of Television * Telepistemology of the Closet * The Alterity of the Present * From Representation to Norms: Reifying Heteronormativity * Desperately Straight: Subverting Heteronormativity * The Meaning of ‘Family’ * Marriage and The Queer Family * Episode Guide * Works Cited * Index *