Queering l'Acadie: Unsettling identity, language, and place in contemporary Acadian cultural productions

Abstract

In this research, I focus on the queering of Acadie. Queering, used as a verb, is a way to un-settle and challenge normative institutions and systems (i.e. colonialism, language, iden-tity), and gives us tools for an inclusive future. I will reveal and make sense of the complex-ities of language and its role in identity construction, as well as the unsettling of place; I ex-amine how three queer Acadian writers reclaim this language as a tool of resistance against both language surveillance and colonial heteronormative discourses. My corpus includes Fif and Sauvage by Shayne Michael, Overlap by Céleste Godin, and a selection of poems by Xavier Gould. These Acadian writers explore the connections between Acadian and queer identities and issues of language, territory and sovereignty, relations of reciprocity, abjection and embodiment. My analysis of this body of work draws on theoretical insights of Sara Ahmed, Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, and Homi Bhabha, among others. In addi-tion to poststructural discourse analysis, I use a queer linguistics approach, which chal-lenges heteronormativity from a linguistic lens, that is, by examining the various linguistic mechanisms involved in creating queer identities through language, but also how language is part of identity-construction. Queerness is often invisible in Acadian literature, so the purpose of this research is to highlight the importance of paying attention to gender and sexuality as facets of cultural identity. By paying attention to the voices and experiences of marginalized Acadians, a greater understanding of shifting social roles and linguistic prac-tices in relation to identity construction emerges.