Queerly Rural, Rurally Queer
An Autoethnographic Literary Analysis of Hillbilly Queer
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15763/issn.2376-5275.2024.6.2.62-91Keywords:
rural, queer, young adult, English Language Arts, literacy, pedagogy, LGBTQIA2SAbstract
Recently, the number of books featuring both queer and rural youth experiences has increased (Kedley et al., 2022), including Jamison’s (2021) Hillbilly Queer: A Memoir. The present study examined how this book functions as a memoir about young adult experiences and analyzed the possibilities it offers rural queer students as well as rural and/or queer educators. Through a queer autoethnographic literary analysis, the authors draw upon their experiences as once closeted rural queer youth and former openly queer secondary English language arts educators teaching in rural and rural-serving public schools. This study found important benefits for rural queer adolescents and significant implications for the English language arts classroom.
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