Queerly Rural, Rurally Queer

Abstract

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.

Keywords

• rural
• queer
• young adult
• English Language Arts
• literacy
• pedagogy