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Intersectionality, queer studies and hybridity: methodological frameworks for social research

Research output: Contribution to Journal/MagazineJournal articlepeer-review

Published
Article number3
<mark>Journal publication date</mark>2013
<mark>Journal</mark>Journal of International Women's Studies
Issue number2
Volume13
Number of pages14
Pages (from-to)19-32
Publication StatusPublished
Early online date1/03/12
<mark>Original language</mark>English
EventWinning and Short-listed Entries from the 2010 Feminist and Women’s Studies Association Annual Student Essay Competition - , United Kingdom
Duration: 1/09/2010 → …

Other

OtherWinning and Short-listed Entries from the 2010 Feminist and Women’s Studies Association Annual Student Essay Competition
Country/TerritoryUnited Kingdom
Period1/09/10 → …

Abstract

This article seeks to draw links between intersectionality and queer studies as epistemological strands by examining their common methodological tasks and by tracing some similar difficulties of translating theory into research methods. Intersectionality is the systematic study of the ways in which differences such as race, gender, sexuality, class, ethnicity and other sociopolitical and cultural identities interrelate.Queer theory, when applied as a distinct methodological approach to the study of gender and sexuality, has sought to denaturalise categories of analysis and make normativity visible. By
examining existing research projects framed as 'queer' alongside ones that use intersectionality, I consider the importance of positionality in research accounts. I revisit Judith Halberstam's (1998) 'Female Masculinity' and Gloria Anzaldua's (1987) 'Borderlands' and discuss the tension between the act of naming and the critical strategical adoption of categorical thinking. Finally, I suggest hybridity as one possible complementary methodological approach to those of intersectionality and queer studies. Hybridity can facilitate an understanding of shifting textual and material borders and can operate as a creative and political mode of destabilising not only complex social locations, but also research frameworks.