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"Through a self-consciously partial and incomplete genealogy, this book historicizes and examines queer performativity while questioning its very bases. The key argument of In Between Subjects is that, by interrogating how queer performance and gender performativity have come to seem so obviously conjoined, beginning with the immediate post WWII period in Anglophone art and theory, we arrive at a much deeper understanding of the valance and texture of "queer" and "performance" or the "performative" (as well as of related concepts such as "theatricality" (and camp), and "relationality"): each of the chapters after the introduction are thus oriented around one of these key terms, arranged in a roughly chronological order per the moment of their emergence and relevance to debates about queer theory, identity, and performance or performativity: performativity (1950sff), relationality (late 1950sff), theatricality (1960sff), queer (late 1980s as attached to "theory," and following), other (1990sff), and trans (2000sff). The narrative of the book is deliberately recursive, itself articulated in order performatively to demonstrate the specific valence and social context of each concept as it emerged, but also the overlap and interrelation among the terms as they have come to co constitute one another in performance and visual arts theory, history, and practice. Written from a hybrid art historical and performance studies point of view, with attention to feminist, queer, and sexuality studies frameworks, this will be essential reading for all those interested in art, performance and gender"--
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