Queer Polyfamily Performativity: Family Practices and Adaptive Strategies Among LGBTQ + Polyamorists

Abstract

This research explores LGBTQ+ (queer) polyamorous family practices. This work is critical for family studies, as queer polyamorous families challenge heteronormativity, resist assimilationism, and broaden cultural understandings of family. This article presents findings from a larger qualitative study on queer polyamory that involved in-depth interviews with 55 queer adults of diverse identities and backgrounds who had experience with polyamory. Queer polyamorists engage in and value a variety of non-normative family practices, or queer polyfamily performativities, and formulate creative adaptive strategies to monocentric cultural constraints. Yet, their family narratives focus on cultural symbols that are central to conventional understandings of family such as households, children, and support. These findings suggest that queer polyamorous families challenge heteronormativity, but not necessarily by rejecting normative understandings of family. Rather, they expand conventional notions with their unique family performativities. These findings speak to current political struggles, contemporary family practices, and changing meanings of family.

Keywords:

• GLBTQ
• polyamory
• queer families
• monocentrism
• heteronormativity

Acknowledgements

I am deeply appreciative of Dr. Glenna Spitze and Dr. Kathy Trent for their valuable comments and suggestions.