Jesus, Dolly Parton, and Solid Gold: Risk and Resilience in a Southern Gay Childhood

• In Event: Landscapes of Curriculum: Intersections of Place, Sexuality, and Interdisciplinarity in Curriculum Studies

Abstract

The presentations conclude with this engaging piece, in which the author, an award-winning storyteller from eastern Tennessee, explores the relationship between the secular and the sacred in his growing-up and coming out—a blending of which seems uniquely Southern. Only in the South could Jesus and Dolly Parton both be saviors, and sources of risk. In a narrative performance that serves to illustrate the penchant for stories and storytelling that Kincheloe names as one of the south’s “treasures” (1991, p. 145), the author comments more broadly on the dynamic nature of risk and resilience- recognizing that what might be protective in one context may be a source of vulnerability in another. Just like being gay and just like the South itself.

Author

• Travis S. Wright, University of WIsconsin- Madison