The Oxford Encyclopedia of Queer Studies and Communication 3

Queer communication studies is not a new field of study, although the uneven and hesitant embrace of queer topics and perspectives across the subfields of communication studies is evident to anyone who browses book series or journals in the field. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Queer Studies and Communication gathers the world’s expertise on these topics in one resource allows readers to appreciate the work of the scholars who have persevered at this intellectual intersection to demonstrate how the central questions of these two seemingly disparate disciplines share common concerns about bodies, modes of relationality, representation, and cultural norms.

Articles in this resource address the international flows of queer identities, practices, and representation. Communication studies and queer studies rightfully have been critiqued for their Western biases. With these problematics in mind, then, the authors in this Encyclopedia interrogate whether and how queerness matters on five continents. Other contributors in this volume reassess communication theory through a queer lens to make visible the creative capacities of individuals and groups to redefine default assumptions about relationships and communities. Still other articles explore the ongoing conversation between queer studies and trans studies.

The 72 articles in this Encyclopedia fall into seven main categories: Queer Media, Queer Kinship, Queer Identities, Queer Health, Global Queer Studies, Queer Methodology, and Key Terms. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Queer Studies and Communication is a key reference for anyone involved in the study, research, or practice of media and communication studies.

Isaac West is Associate Professor of Communication Studies at Vanderbilt University. Professor West’s research focuses primarily on legal rhetorics and their role in constituting us as citizens of states, nations, and the world. His first book, Transforming Citizenships: Transgender Articulations of the Law (NYU Press, 2014), engages trans advocacy and activism to demonstrate how these citizenship claims can queer legal norms and conventions. Transforming Citizenships was a finalist for the 2014 Lambda Literary Award in LGBT Studies. Professor West has also written related essays about centrality of gender and sexuality to our understanding of citizenship, including how bakers have employed religious freedom as a justification for not treating everyone equally, the ethics and appropriateness of employing ＂like race＂ analogies in queer advocacy, and how coming out narratives are produced and mean different things to different audiences.