Disrupting Queer Panic(!) and Reimagining Joy in Educational Research

• In Event: Reauthoring Queer Joy and Justice

Abstract

How might we thicken the theorizing of queer joy? How might queer joy be used to address the racist, colonial, queerphobic, and transphobic projects of schooling? This paper advances the emerging practice of joy as a framework for researchers working with youth in schools, and playfully pushes towards reimagining educational research as a site of curiosity, pleasure, messiness, and dream-building. I offer five definitional tenants of queer joy and stretch out its capaciousness in research for educational justice: Reciprocity, bodies, futurity, disruption, and radical imagination. Here, I texturize the concept of joy and move it towards more lively possibilities and imaginings. Ultimately, I argue for a collective responsibility in shifting how we research and talk about 2SLGBTQI+ youth in schools.

Author

• Melissa Erin Keehn, University of New Brunswick