queer appalachia: toward geographies of possibility

243 Pages·2016·3.85 MB·English

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University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School
2010
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Mathias J. Detamore
University of Kentucky, [email protected]
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Detamore, Mathias J., "QUEER APPALACHIA: TOWARD GEOGRAPHIES OF POSSIBILITY" (2010). University
of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations. 57.
https://uknowledge.uky.edu/gradschool_diss/57
This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at UKnowledge. It has been
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ABSTRACT OF DISSERTATION

Mathias J Detamore

The Graduate School
University of Kentucky
2010
QUEER APPALACHIA:
TOWARD GEOGRAPHIES OF POSSIBILITY

____________________________
ABSTRACT OF DISSERTATION
____________________________
A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the
College of Arts and Sciences
at the University of Kentucky

By
Mathias J. Detamore
Lexington, Kentucky

Director: Dr. Anna J. Secor, Professor of Geography
Lexington, Kentucky

2010

Copyright © Mathias J Detamore 2010
ABSTRACT OF DISSERTATION

QUEER APPALACHIA:
TOWARD GEOGRAPHIES OF POSSIBILITY

Stereotypes about Appalachia abound through dubious and reductive representations
of the ‘hillbilly’ icon. Sexuality and how it functions in Appalachia is usually cast from the
outside as wild, violent, bestial, incestuous and generally base. Movies such as Deliverance
and television shows such as The Beverly Hillbillies and The Dukes of Hazard render images
of Appalachian sexuality as hyper-sexual, both naive and violent. These images of Appalachian
sexual ignorance and violence that permeate popular culture have had problematic and
reductive implications for rural gay/trans Appalachian folk. Mainstream gay culture has often
used the perceived meanings of these images to circumscribe and foreclose upon the
possibility of rural queer life, rendering the rural as monolithically homophobic and
impenetrable.

This research attempts to destabilize this perspective and critique the impulse for
mainstream gay culture to further marginalize rural gay/trans folk in Appalachia. The project
reveals the possibility for rural queer life to exist in Appalachia to show not only its presence,
but also its varying forms of visibility. To do this, experimental methodologies are employed,
drawing on autoethnography that have located my body as an active participant and research
object in one particular Appalachian queer geography. By actively participating in a rural queer
network, the possibility for Appalachian queer geographies to exist in ways that surpass
popular representations emerge in a way that force us to renegotiate our understandings of
homophobia and what sets its conditions.

This project begins to uncover and theorize the ways in which kinship as a ‘social
technology’ mitigates social strangeness and operates as a means for social protection and
intimacy within rural queer populations. This research is presented in a way that neither
dismisses nor emphasizes homophobic violence, but rather argues the imperative for strong
political advocacy that recognizes both the struggles and accomplishments of rural gay/trans
folk. Three interlinked approaches are used to highlight these possibilities and foreclosures: the
exterior representation of Appalachian sexuality in American metropolitan gay cultures and its
politico-cultural effects on rural gay/trans folk, a more nuanced interpretation of homophobia in
Appalachia, and how ‘place’ is made through the operation of rural queer networks.

KEYWORDS: Queer Geography, Appalachia and Rurality,
Queer Kinship, Autoethnography, Geographies
of Possibility

____M_a_th_i_a_s_ J_ D__e_ta_m__o_re_ __________
Student Signature
____J_u_n_e_ 2_4_,_ 2_0_1_0_ _______________
Date
QUEER APPALACHIA:
TOWARD GEOGRAPHIES OF POSSIBILITY

By

Mathias J. Detamore

____D_r_._ A_n_n_a_ _J_ S_e_c_o_r_ ____________
Director of Dissertation

____D_r_. _M_i_c_h_a_e_l _S_a_m_e_r_s_ __________
Director of Graduate Studies

____J_u_n_e_ _2_4_, _2_0_1_0_ ______________
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DISSERTATION

Mathias J. Detamore

The Graduate School
University of Kentucky
2010
QUEER APPALACHIA:
TOWARD GEOGRAPHIES OF POSSIBILITY

____________________________
DISSERTATION
____________________________
A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the
College of Arts and Sciences
at the University of Kentucky

By
Mathias J. Detamore
Lexington, Kentucky

Director: Dr. Anna J. Secor, Professor of Geography
Lexington, Kentucky

2010

Copyright © Mathias J Detamore 2010
I dedicate this work to:

My mother, Pamela Detamore and my father, Richard Detamore for their
continued support, admiration and love through all of my endeavors

Dr. Colleen McTague who found a troubled architecture student and
turned him into a geographer

and

My boyfriend and partner in crime Steven Glowicki,
my muse who inspired me to finish