Queers in American Popular Culture
[3 volumes]
by Jim Elledge, Editor
October 2010, 945pp, 6 1/8x9 1/4
3 volumes, Praeger

Hardcover: 978-0-313-35457-1
$171, £132, 149€, A235
Please contact your preferred distributor for pricing.
eBook Available: 978-0-313-35458-8
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Queer culture isn’t a small, isolated subset of society, nor is it a new movement. The acknowledged father of bodybuilding, Eugen Sandow, was gay and lived in the late 1800s. Burlesque troupes in the early 1900s often featured female impersonators performing risqué dances—unbeknownst to their audiences. And the debate over gay marriage actually originated in the 1950s.

This three-volume collection of essays reveals the widespread existence of queer men and women in American popular culture, and showcases their important yet little-known role in shaping our society over the last 120 years.

The virtually unknown existence of gay, bisexual, and queer men and women in American popular culture from the late 1800s through the present day is a fascinating topic for many readers, regardless of their own orientation. Whether it’s the father of bodybuilding, famous closeted entertainers or sports stars, or the leading characters in current television shows and films, queer men and women have changed the face of American popular culture and society for over a century. Ironically, most of the fascinating information, anecdotes, and revealing facts about well-known figures in American culture are virtually unknown to the typical U.S. citizen.

Elledge’s Queers in American Popular Culture covers a wide variety of historical and current topics that documents how the queer community has been—and continues to be—one of the most significant shapers of American popular culture. Currently, no other book covers queer topics in American popular culture as broadly as this text.

Features

  • Offers a collection of works by 39 distinguished international contributors, each an expert in his/her field
  • Includes 45 in-depth essays, all but three of which were written specifically for this three-volume set
  • An index in each volume allows for easy access by subject and by proper name
Jim Elledge, PhD, is poet, scholar, and professor of English and director of the masters in professional writing program at Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw, GA. His most recent collection, A History of My Tattoo, won the 2006 Lambda Award in poetry and was a finalist for the Thom Gunn award in poetry, and his H, a fictional, impressionistic biography of outsider artist Henry Darger in prose poems, is forthcoming.

Reviews

"The essays are absorbing reading, and the set overall is a useful resource for students and scholars of LGBT issues and pop culture in many disciplines. . . . Recommended."—Choice, April 1, 2011
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