Research & Projects

My dissertation, Privates: Performance, Privacy, and the Productions of Publics, develops the concept of privates. These are often intentionally assembled, semi-bounded spaces where collective knowledge is produced before it becomes legible as public. If the term privates sounds anatomical, that is partly the point: we are taught to look away from the private, to treat it as embarrassing, secondary, and/or outside analysis. It is precisely that reflex that has helped obscure the smaller formations that make public life possible. A queer studies lens is especially useful here because it helps theorize those intimate, semi-visible, and often misrecognized spaces before publics fully assemble. By naming and theorizing privates, the project offers a way to understand how the public sphere is not simply given, but produced through small-scale, shared performances that make collective life possible.