Painted Nails: The Gender(ed) Performance of Queer Sexuality

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

Spring 2020

Abstract

In this essay, I interrogate my own experiences performing my queer identity through my painted nails. I attest to the ways queer bodies might performatively challenge and/or reinforce rigid norms of sexuality through mundane performances of (gendered) identity. To accomplish this, I engage in an autoethnographic exploration of queer performativity. I recount and analyze a series of anecdotes that illustrate how performances of queer identity in everyday life are accomplished—and policed—in mundane situations. In turn, I reflexively investigate the ways in which these performances situate me within a nexus of aesthetic, embodied, and ethical social interaction and performative resistance. I end by drawing conclusions about the ethics of performance, dialogue, and civility in identity politics.

Department

Communication Studies

Publication Title

Women & Language

DOI

10.34036/WL.2020.002

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