I finished reading Queer Theory, Gender Theory: An Instant Primer by Riki Wilchins. As I have said previously, I don't read a lot of non-fiction so a lot of what was being said in this was new to me. Postmodern theory, Derrida, Foucault. Nothing I had heard of. Despite that the book was accessible enough for me to follow.

The applications of postmoderism Wilchins presents though are ideas that have been floating, rather informally, in my mind for a while. The idea of man and woman being a gender binary which should be broken apart seems to me to match some of my ideas around identifying as "queer" rather than "gay". Wilchins presents the boxes "man" and "woman" (as only ever defined as a derivative of "Man") in the same way I do "gay", "lesbian" and "bi" and uncovers similar problems with identifying within them. Of course, my definition of queer cannot stand without the definition of straight and is presented as it's opposite and derivative - a superb way to put forward an air of inferiority.

I'm going to read some other, similarly veined books and have a go at re-examining some of my beliefs and working them into essays.

Alex
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