Access Type

Open Access Dissertation

Date of Award

January 2012

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Department

Communication

First Advisor

Sandra Pensoneau-Conway

Abstract

Born out of my personal relationships with others and the field of communication, particularly as it overlaps and intersects with the field of personal relationship research, this project begins with an exploration of research practices personal relationship inquiry, offers a queer critique on research and relating, and forwards a queer applied communication approach--relational inqueery. This dissertation was directed by three goals: (a) creating a space and terrain for queer relationships in the study of personal relationships and relational communication, (b) founding and beginning to further a field of relational inqueery, and (c) offering an applied communication approach within queer relational studies that stands to benefit both the field and the queer on social and personal fronts. To those ends, I offer a queer criticism of research and relating, engendering a space for queer relationships. I then offer a meta-autoethnographic approach of personal and co-constructed narratives and writing-stories to engage, contour, and nuance the aforementioned space for queer relationships imagining new ways of thinking about research in the study of personal relationships and relational futures. This project contributes to the fields of personal relationship research, communication, and qualitative inquiry.

Included in

Communication Commons

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