Survival of a Perverse Nation: Morality and Queer Possibility in Armenia

by Tamar R. Shirinian

In Survival of a Perverse Nation, Tamar R. Shirinian traces two widespread rhetorics of perversion—sexual and moral—in postsocialist Armenia, showing how they are tied to anxieties about the nation’s survival. In her fieldwork with Armenians, Shirinian found that right-wing nationalists’ focus on sexual perversion centers the figure of the homosexual, while questions of moral perversion surround oligarchs and other members of the political-economic elite. While the homosexual is seen as non- or improperly reproductive, the oligarch’s moral deviations from the caring and paternalistic expectations associated with national leadership also endanger Armenia’s survival. Shirinian shows how both figures threaten the nation’s proper social reproduction, a source of great anxiety for a nation whose primary point of identity is surviving genocide. In the existential threat posed by these forms of perversion Shirinian finds paths where nonsurvival might mean the creation of futures that are queerer and more just. Detailing how the language of perversion offers trenchant critiques of capitalism as a perversion of life, Shirinian presents a new queer theory of political economy.

Genres: Nonfiction

304 pages, Paperback

Published November 15, 2024

Reviews

[Willi Mend · Rating 5 out of 5]

…just an amazing text with an quite interesting methodology to enter and render the field! The Book feels for me like figurative painting exhibition with several works in it trying to circulate around a complex situation in a complex and ambiguous society. The book brings light and clarity into this ambiguity of knowing. A must read