Survival angst: Reading Hothead Paisan in the Trump era

J Lesbian Stud. 2018;22(4):415-423. doi: 10.1080/10894160.2018.1449994. Epub 2018 Apr 25.

Abstract

This essay considers Diane DiMassa's 1990s comic book series Hothead Paisan: Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist alongside the recent rise and visibility of White supremacist movements following the 2016 United States election. While Hothead's acts of queer revenge primarily target White heterosexual cismen, several issues feature Hothead taking aim at neo-Nazis and the KKK. Exploring the way in which Hothead's relationship to debility and capacity is mediated by her gender, sexuality, and race, the essay argues that a biopolitical approach, including the recent scholarly turn to the non-human, can provide a useful framework for approaching interlocking systems of violence and oppression that go beyond traditional intersectional models of resistance.

Keywords: Biopolitics; disability; intersectionality; non-human; queer movements.

Publication types

  • Historical Article

MeSH terms

  • Anxiety / etiology*
  • Female
  • Graphic Novels as Topic / history*
  • History, 20th Century
  • History, 21st Century
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Politics*
  • Racism / history*
  • Sexual and Gender Minorities / history*
  • Sexual and Gender Minorities / psychology
  • United States