Kacen Callender's Felix Ever After (2020) and queer epistemologies
cry counter is now the rage counter: 10 (throw away some of these trash characters)
epistemology: the study of how we know what we know; how we make knowledge: this is about knowledge production of racialization, sexualities, etc
is we take seriously that YA lit is about YA agency, what does this help us see about YA epistemologies? Queer-YA epistemologies?
How might this novel teach readers who might not know "trans"
the use of LGBTQ center and narrating "he discourse" (Chapter 13)
self-portraits and self-fashioning (Jill and the portraits: (pg 172)
the use of rage to get us to a different affective structure
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THEN WHY ARE YOU SKIPPING, KID
the genre of mystery
chapter is framed by transphobic cyber bullying: "It feels good to tell you the truth" (169). Dramatizes one way of approaching a thing we don't know--maybe fear? Reaffirms that assigned sex at birth; it also sets up empathy with Felix
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in the most pluralistic, liberal model of the humanities, it's about showing and teaching difference
self-questioning:
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teaching James cis and "you can't joke about anything anymore" (158) - dramatizing the response about how/why people have emotional attachments to language and "jokes"; it's also some online discourse
again, it's how we produce knowledge--and who has/does not have the language
also shows the ways about who gets education and "educating oneself"; doesn't make Felix do the teaching
and this epistemology is tied to the circulation of the book as book; can this be in libraries? What happens in classrooms?
curriculum development and social control; erasure and making marginal communities and lives
curric and morality: "Morality, at its essence, defines what is human" - this is about the limits of the human; "There needs to be a moral judgmement in creation" (95)
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How does Callender use different rhetorical moves and registers (different literary techniques) to explore who and how gets to define what a body/life is? (pg 177-87)
the debate of the traditional gender roles: 'There are too many expectations on gender roles, even within the transgender community" (Sarah t(183) -- Queer communities are not all the same and emphasizes indiviual agency/choice; showing "Some of us don't have a gender at all" - Tom ;
Creating Bex and they/them pronouns: the idea of personal/indivual agency with gender
the email draft: "Your son/child/still to be determined" (179). frames the chapter with exploration, research, and resources
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refrmaes the "marketplace of ideas" to show how heterogenous ideas circulate
"crack with a weed pushing through" - images of nature to reaffirm change and growth and becoming;
repurposed journaling and literary history of journaling and letters (epistolary novel)