On accountability: Towards a white middle-class queer ‘post identity politics identity politics’

Abstract

Writing about white middle-class queer subjectivities is a necessarily difficult task. Partly, this is because of ongoing debates over identity politics (and indeed post-identity politics), and partly because writing as a white middle-class queer always appears to invoke a particular ‘yes but’ (‘yes I am white and middle-class but I am also queer’). In this article I outline one way of engaging in a white middle-class queer praxis that takes into account these two issues, and uses them as a starting place from which to think about the intersections of whiteness, queerness and class in potentially novel ways. Drawing on the work of Jodi Dean, I elaborate what I term a ‘white middle-class queer post-identity politics identity politics’ that centres issues of reciprocity and accountability by considering the role of others in the constitution of the self. Recognizing the fundamental indebtedness that arises from this represents one means through which to negotiate a speaking position as a white middle-class queer that evokes an altogether different ‘yes but’, one that is mindful of race and class privilege.

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