The Politics of Loss and Its Remains in "Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt"

Using Judith Butler's notion of the "ungrievable life" this project examines the politics of loss and its remains in Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, an award-winning documentary featuring five diverse lives, represented by panels in the AIDS Memorial Quilt, and their subsequen...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Rhetoric & public affairs 2007-12, Vol.10 (4), p.681-699
Main Author: Yep, Gust A.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome
AIDS
Butler, Judith
Documentary films
Epidemics
Gay rights
Grief
HIV
Human immunodeficiency virus
Male homosexuality
Medical treatment
Memorials & monuments
Memory
Men
Political factors
Political rhetoric
Politics
Queer culture
Queer studies
Quilts
Sexuality
Citations: Items that cite this one
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Summary:Using Judith Butler's notion of the "ungrievable life" this project examines the politics of loss and its remains in Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, an award-winning documentary featuring five diverse lives, represented by panels in the AIDS Memorial Quilt, and their subsequent loss. The essay is divided into four sections. The first discusses the notion of loss and its remains. The second provides a brief overview of the film and situates it in the political and historical context in which it was produced and circulated. Using the concepts of bodily, spatial, and ideal remains, the third section analyzes the politics of loss in the film. The essay concludes by examining these politics two decades after the AIDS Memorial Quilt was originally displayed.
ISSN:1094-8392
1534-5238
1534-5238
DOI:10.1353/rap.2008.0025