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SUMMARY:Disease and Identity: AIDS\, Mourning and Performance in Paul Mone
 tte's Love Alone - Gerardo con Diaz
DTSTART:20090427T184500Z
DTEND:20090427T200000Z
UID:TALK18109@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:David Gordon
DESCRIPTION:In 1988\, Paul Monette (1945-1995)\, an American screenwriter 
 and poet\, published Love Alone: 18 Elegies for Rog. A collection of poems
  written during the five months after his lover Roger Horwitz died of AIDS
 \,  these long\, unpunctuated elegies bring together images of bronchoscop
 ies\, blood exams\, bodies\, heroes\, and war\; but Monette meant for them
  to be a transcript of his love that would inspire anyone infected with\, 
 or affected by\, AIDS.  In this talk\, I explore the way in which Monette'
 s poetry illustrates and complements theoretic accounts on the difficultie
 s of conceptualizing and representing AIDS. I bring together recent theori
 es about the role of mourning in the AIDS pandemic\, the (de)construction 
 of queer identities\, and postmodern representations of the diseased body 
 to study Monette's literary selves. Furthermore\, I demonstrate how theori
 es of the body\, mourning\, and performance developed in the 1980's provid
 e a useful framework in which contemporary theorists can make sense of a p
 atient's perception of AIDS and its medications.\n \nBio: Gerardo Con Diaz
  is an MPhil student in History and Philosophy of Science and a member of 
 Trinity College. An alumn of the Mathematics Department at Harvard Univers
 ity and a Harvard-Cambridge Scholar\, Gerardo received several awards for 
 his lecturing and speaking during his undergraduate career. A former motiv
 ational speaker for the Costa Rican Office of Education\, Gerardo is writi
 ng an MPhil dissertation on theories of AIDS and the body in the United St
 ates in the early nineties. 
LOCATION:Nihon Room\, Pembroke College
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