Jenée Wilde, PhD candidate, UO Department of English (Folklore), "The BiSciFi Project: Researching Speculative Fictions and Bisexual Lives"

Abstract: The dissertation is concerned with bisexuality on three cultural levels—bisexual identity and community, bisexual representation and interpretation, and bisexuality as a category of knowledge. On the level of group identity, I am not so much interested in understanding how bisexuality is defined by individuals but rather why some people choose to self-identify as bisexual rather than (or in addition to) queer, pansexual, fluid, genderqueer, or other terms that resist binary categorization or refuse them outright. I’m interested in how this self-definition helps some people to understand their social and cultural experiences and to find communities. Moreover, I’m interested in how non-realistic or “speculative” fiction genres may have contributed to some bisexual people’s experiences of group identity and community.

Publications:

“Gay, Queer or Dimensional? Modes of Reading Bisexuality on Torchwood,” Journal of Bisexuality, vol. 15, no. 3, 2015, pp. 414-434

“Dimensional Sexuality: Exploring New Frameworks for Bisexual Desires,” Sexual and Relationship Therapy, vol. 29, no. 3, August 2014, pp. 320-38