‘Does the picture below show a heterosexual couple or not?’

Reflexivity, entextualization, scales and intersectionalities in a gay man’s blog

Authors

  • Luiz Paulo Moita-Lopes Federal University of Rio de Janeiro
  • Branca Falabella Fabrício Federal University of Rio de Janeiro

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1558/genl.34675

Keywords:

Reflexivity, Scales, Entextualization, Intersectionalities

Abstract

In this paper we investigate an intimate encounter in 'Life in the Closet', a blog fed by a Brazilian undergraduate, N.B., between 2011 and 2014. As a case in point, we focus on how a YouTube video advert called 'The Man Man' is successively entextualised in the blog, by following its re-entextualisation into posts made by the blogger himself and other participants. We explore this digital event as an instance of several chained reperformances, observing the highly reflexive activity that goes on in the blog and how such reflexivity operates through the friction of sedimented and transgressive discourses. By using a performative and scalesensitive approach to textuality and subjectivities, we fathom how participants reflexively queer gender, sexuality, age, race and social class by intersectionally making each one of these 'categories' dissolve its solidified meaning in the light of the Other as these meanings are called into being.

Author Biographies

  • Luiz Paulo Moita-Lopes, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro

    Luiz Paulo Moita-Lopes is professor of applied linguistics at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. He is a researcher of the Brazilian National Research Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq 302935/2017-7). He has published on epistemological issues on applied linguistics, on language and gender, sexuality and race performativities, and on language and globalisation.

  • Branca Falabella Fabrício, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro

    Branca Falabella Fabrício is associate professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and a researcher of the Brazilian National Research Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq 311578/2016-0). Her research interests comprise queer literacies, identity and language performativities, and text trajectories on the web.

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Published

2018-12-05

How to Cite

Moita-Lopes, L. P., & Fabrício, B. F. (2018). ‘Does the picture below show a heterosexual couple or not?’: Reflexivity, entextualization, scales and intersectionalities in a gay man’s blog. Gender and Language, 12(4), 459-478. https://doi.org/10.1558/genl.34675