Reading Sexualities: Hermeneutic Theory and the Future of Queer Studies

Reading Sexualitiesconfronts the reigning practices, priorities, and preoccupations of queer theory and sexuality studies. Looking at a range of texts, from novels to travel narratives to internet porn, Donald E. Hall deftly weaves the theoretical with the literary in order to: examine the vexed ethical, critical, and political questions arising from sexual consumerism and cross-cultural encounters read the changing landscape of sexual identity, finding great cause for optimism and enthusiastic engagement urge readers to embrace a far-reaching dialogic practice as a mechanism for furthering radical social change. Reading Sexualitiesshows how our sexual desires and bases for identification are being widely challenged and changed. Drawing on hermeneutic theory and the work of Hans-Georg Gadamer, Hall argues that by approaching sexual diversity with openness and humility, we become active participants in the politically urgent process of reading the self through the perspective of the other.

Donald E. Hall is Jackson Distinguished Professor of English and Chair of the Department of English at West Virginia University, USA. He is a long-time political activist, and the author or editor of nine previous books in the fields of gender studies, higher education studies, and Victorian studies.

Introduction: Reading Sexualities 1. Sexual Hermeneutics 2. Desirably Queer Futures 3. Transcending the Self 4. Frameworks for Global Conversations 5. Radical Sexuality and Ethical Responsibility Conclusion: How Sex Changes