Queer Fictions of the Past History, Culture, and Difference [Paperback]

This book explores the role of history and literature in gay and lesbian identity, and in queer theory.This is the first book to look at how lesbians and gays use history to define themselves as social, cultural, and political subjects. Bravmann shows how historical representations are dynamic conversations between past and present, creating individual and collective meanings. Exploring the theoretical and political ramifications of this project, he considers how historiography, ancient Greece, the Stonewall riots, and postmodern historical texts inform and reflect race, gender, class, and political differences in queer subjectivity.This is the first book to look at how lesbians and gays use history to define themselves as social, cultural, and political subjects. Bravmann shows how historical representations are dynamic conversations between past and present, creating individual and collective meanings. Exploring the theoretical and political ramifications of this project, he considers how historiography, ancient Greece, the Stonewall riots, and postmodern historical texts inform and reflect race, gender, class, and political differences in queer subjectivity.This is the first book to look at how lesbians and gays use history to define themselves as social, cultural, and political subjects. Bravmann shows how historical representations are dynamic conversations between past and present, creating individual and collective meanings. Exploring the theoretical and political ramifications of this project, he considers how historiography, ancient Greece, the Stonewall riots, and postmodern historical texts inform and reflect race, gender, class, and political differences in queer subjectivity.Part I. Queer Cultural Studies of History: 1. Metanarrative and gay identity; 2. Queer historical subjects; Part II. Reading Past Histories: 3. Re: reading queer history; 4. The lesbian and gay past: it's Greek to whom?; 5. Queer fictions of Stonewall; 6. Re/writing queer histlÇ