Guizzardi L. Queer Aesthetics: Reflections on the Queer through the Lens of Georg Simmel

Authors: Luca Guizzardi

Abstract

The article wants to outline some theoretical reflections about queer aesthetics. Who is a queer individual? How can a queer individual be imagined? The queer subject or, better still, queer identities, shatter the dominant perspective of society in the same way as Simmel’s stranger. The queer subject is the strange(r) of society and in society and, as the author shall try to show, queer could therefore be observed, from that Simmelian perspective, as a social form. In fact, the essential point the article is about to make is that queer should be seen as a cultural form. The contribution will sketch out a possible definition of queer. The figure of the outsider and Simmel’s social aesthetic theory will then be taken up in order to develop a possible link between the two – the perception of queerness and the individual’s reaction to it. Finally, in the conclusions will mention various reflections on the meaning of queer as a cultural form of our modern life.

Keywords: Queer, Aesthetics/Esthétique, Intimacy/Intimité, Georg Simmel

DOI: 10.13131/unipi/hjzd-w733

Notes on contributors

LUCA GUIZZARDI è Ricercatore a tempo indeterminato in Sociologia dei processi culturali e comunicativi presso l’Università di Bologna. Attualmente è membro del consiglio scientifico della sezione Studi di genere dell’Associazione Italiana di Sociologia.
Email: luca.guizzardi@unibo.it