“Queer Television and Bad Objects” with Hollis Griffin

Queer Lit

Queer television is clearly having a moment and I got to learn more about this from my new favourite LGBTQ TV expert: Hollis Griffin. From the problematic categorisation of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ representation to watching telly at the gay bar, we talk about what queer TV can and can’t do and why it’s so enjoyable even when it’s bad. Hollis shares expert knowledge, personal anecdotes and an amazing Lauren Berlant quote: “Nobody like their pleasure undone by somebody with a theory.”

References:
Gentrification Imaginaries Conference
Freiburg University
Maria Sulimma
Hollis Griffin's Feeling Normal: Sexuality and Media Criticism in the Digital Age (Indiana, 2017)
Hollis Griffin (ed) Television Studies in Queer Times (Routledge, 2023)
Hollis Griffin's Securing the Big Apple: Television and the Gentrification of New York (forthcoming)
Will and Grace
Lauren Berlant’s Desire/Love
Cael Keegan’s “In Praise of the Bad Transgender Object: Sleepaway Camp” (2020)
https://www.flowjournal.org/2020/07/in-praise-of-the-bad-sleepaway/
Allison Page’s Media and the Affective Life of Slavery (2022)
Melrose Place
Aaron Spelling
Interview with the Vampire Isaac
Fellman’s Dead Collection
Susan Stryker
The Fathers Project
Hunter Hargraves

Questions you should be able to respond to after listening:

1. What does representation mean? In how far it is a useful category?
2. What can ‘bad objects’ teach us? Do you have an example?
3. What are places where one might watch queer TV and how do these places influence viewing behaviour?
4. Why is there pleasure in watching TV? Which shows do you enjoy?
5. Please look up at least one of the scholars that you learned about in this episode and find out more about their work.