‘Can you get more American than Native American?’: drag and settler colonialism in<i>RuPaul’s Drag Race</i>

Upadhyay, Nishant

doi:10.1080/09502386.2019.1584907

Cited by 15 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…I have drawn from transnational scholarship on race, such as Shope's (2007; 2017; 2019) research on the circulation of blackface and jazz music in early 20th century India and Saldhana's (2007) study on the “viscosity of race,” domestic and foreign tourism, and laboring bodies in Goa. Junior scholars in South Asian Diaspora Studies are taking on issues of race informed by Indigenous and Black feminisms, whether in Patel's (2016; 2019) research on race, caste, indigeneity, and questions of solidarity; Thangaraj's (2015; 2017) research on South Asian American masculinity, sport, and anti‐Blackness in South Asian American communities; Krishnamurti's (2013; 2019) work on Canadian Hindus, comics, and settler colonialism; or Upadhyay's (2019a; 2019b) articles on race, settler colonialism, and queer theory. I have benefited immensely from hearing the range of papers presented at Amherst's International Conference, “Caste and Race: Reconfiguring Solidarities The Unfinished Legacy of Dr. B.R.…”

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confidence: 99%

Studying race in the field of South Asian religions

Thomas

2021

Religion Compass

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In this commentary, I discuss scholarship on race in study of religion in South Asia. Using my experiences in the field, I look at how and why studies on race are marginalized, dismissed, and/or misread. I argue that without a feminist analysis informed by women of color feminisms and queer of color critique, race scholarship will only continue to be marginalized and/or misread even as the field of South Asian religions tries to center race as an object of analysis. I foreground race and caste power as a way to critique how threads of power run through much of the field of South Asian religions and structures the ways in which scholarship on race is approached (or not). As Asian studies broadly and South Asian Studies specifically creates new avenues for scholarship on race, the study of religion in South Asia must examine how racism is institutionalized within the field.

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confidence: 99%

Studying race in the field of South Asian religions

Thomas

2021

Religion Compass

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“…8 Predominantly white queer spaces and LGBTQ2S service organizations "may not have the same investment in, capacity for, and approach to the culturally responsive pedagogical work found" within service organizations specifically designed for LGBTQ2S people of colour; Ballroom and Kiki communities involving youth often fill in these service provider gaps (Brockenbrough, 2016, p. 188) xvii normativity" (p. 480). Indeed, Upadhyay (2019) makes clear that "queerness does not inherently transcend gender, sexual, and racial hierarchies. Thus, drag as a genderfucking creative praxis can be co-opted within multiple colonial processes" (p. 481).…”

Section: Defining Key Termsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Thus, drag as a genderfucking creative praxis can be co-opted within multiple colonial processes" (p. 481). This process of co-opting has damaging effects on the rich traditions of Ballroom and Kiki culture and there is a necessity to make an "epistemological shift from romanticizing marginalized politics and praxis to understanding them within a spectrum of resisting and reproducing normative and dominant power structures" (Upadhyay, 2019). Part of this understanding involves keenly listening to elders in these scenes who have invaluable knowledge that is in threat of disappearance if these histories are not attended to and cherished.…”

Section: Defining Key Termsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…12). This has been a concern in contemporary consumerist society where Ballroom culture -vogue in particular -is "blowing up in new ways in European dance studios [and] in suburban recreational centers" (Hart, 2015 (Goldmark, 2015;Hall-Araujo, 2016;Upadhyay, 2019) on the cultural phenomenon that is RPDR suggests that properties of ball culture such as voguing and ball vernacular have been appropriated, infused with US nationalism, whitewashed, and packaged for consumption by mainstream white popular culture via Netflix.…”

Section: Ballroom and Kiki Anxieties Surrounding Appropriative Processesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Serving Each Other: Sharing Economies and Affective Labour in Montreal’s Kiki Scene

Lundy¹

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Against a tense socio-political backdrop of white supremacy, intensifying pressures of neoliberal fiscal austerity, and queer necropolitics, this thesis addresses performance-based activist forms of place-making for urban-based queer, trans, and gender nonconforming communities of colour. Using participant observation and qualitative interviews with pioneering members of Montréal's Kiki scene and Ottawa's emerging Waacking community and interpreting my findings through the theoretical lens of queer of colour theory, critical whiteness studies, queer Latinx performance studies and Chicana feminism, I argue that Kiki subculture, which is maintained by pedagogical processes of 'each one, teach one', is instrumental in facilitating i) life-affirming queer kinship bonds, (ii) alternative ways to simultaneously embody and celebrate nonnormative gender expression with Black, Asian, and Latinx identity, iii) non-capitalist economies of sharing, and iv) hopeful strategies of everyday community activism and resilience to appropriative processes during economic insecurity and necropolitical turmoil. xvi Characterized by "fast, rhythmic arm whipping [that] … incorporates elements of large locomotion, dramatic gesture and facial expression, and narrative," Waacking/Punking developed in underground gay clubs and slowly entered mainstream culture through television and music videos (Bragin, 2014, p. 63-64).9 Similar to the Ballroom scene, Waacking/Punking was a subculture where "dancers staged their rejection of whiteness and Black heteronormativity through affective-kinesthetic practice" (Bragin, p. 70). This performance tradition was lesser known than Ballroom culture but experienced a resurgence in the 2000s as majority heterosexual break dancers (often called b-boys/bgirls) turned to the style for inspiration. With these working definitions in mind, I will briefly describe the timely significance of this project. Physically gathering together 'in the social' has become rarer with the thrust of neoliberal individualism and the ubiquity of hand-held technology that allows for immediate 'social connection' and communication across multiple platforms. My research is significant as it acknowledges the radical potential of 'coming together in the social' in a white supremacist, queer exceptionalist, neoliberal-hyper-capitalist, digital age-especially for working class queer and trans people of colour. With the rise of commercial drag such as RuPaul's Drag Race, which references Ballroom lexicon and vogue performance while simultaneously privileging able-bodiedness, whiteness, and what Cedric J. Robinson (1983) calls 'racial capitalism' without much consideration for Ballroom history, this research is timely as I agree with Nishant Upadhyay (2019) that forms of drag in North America are "not beyond the logics of hegemony and 9 'Whack', like Kiki, is an onomatopoeia that was inspired by comics books such as Batman. 'Punking' is derived from the derogatory slang for a gay person or 'punk' (Bragin, 2014.

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“…I am especially attentive to scholars that have critically considered the relationship to gender and performance (Halberstam, 1998;Muñoz, 1999Muñoz, , 2009. There has been extensive scholarship that has considered the homonormative (Workman, 2020;Edgar, 2011) and homonational (Goldmark, 2015) framing of drag through RPDR, as well as considerations about how drag sustains and perpetuates harmful racial stereotypes (Strings & Bui, 2014;Jenkins, 2013;Zhang, 2016) that privilege whiteness (Hodes & Sandoval, 2018) and settler-colonial attitudes (Upadhyay, 2019). While this scholarship implies that the mainstream commodification of drag upsets its potential for subversion of heteronorms, there has also been scholarship that considers how drag financially sustains (Hankins, 2015) and allows for the creation, and continuation, of queer communities (Parslow, 2020) through the commodification of the art form.…”

Section: Theoretical Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dragging Out Settler-Colonial Society: Exploring Gay and Queer Drag Scenes in Vancouver as (De)Colonial Spaces

Egan¹

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Over the past decade, drag has shifted from an underground art form for queer communities to being a mainstream attraction for heteronormative society. However, one's ability to become a drag performer depends on their personal identities and subjectivities, as exclusionary practices gatekeep the borders of drag communities and businesses in Canada, on the bases of Indigeneity, race, gender, and sexuality. To consider the ways that drag within Canada continues the settler logic of elimination and benefits the goals of heteropatriarchal white supremacy, I conducted interviews with drag performers in Vancouver, a major city for drag performances and performers. This thesis will consider the nuances of Vancouver's drag communities to understand how colonial and neoliberal logics have taken hold of drag spaces that perpetuate and uphold colonial violence, as well as how these logics are resisted through decolonial love and queer worldmaking.

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‘Can you get more American than Native American?’: drag and settler colonialism inRuPaul’s Drag Race

Cited by 15 publications

References 36 publications

Studying race in the field of South Asian religions

Studying race in the field of South Asian religions

Serving Each Other: Sharing Economies and Affective Labour in Montreal’s Kiki Scene

Dragging Out Settler-Colonial Society: Exploring Gay and Queer Drag Scenes in Vancouver as (De)Colonial Spaces

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