No Shame in this Queer Thang: Sex, Place, and Belonging in Charles Rice- González's Chulito

Authors

  • Robert LaRue Moravian University

Abstract

This paper analyzes depictions of sex within Charles Rice-González’s novel, Chulito, which focuses on the sixteen-year-old Puerto Rican American Chulito as he grapples with the impact of his same-sex desires on his place within his South Bronx community. I argue that sex in the novel functions as (1) a resistance to notions of shame that suggest queer sex as base or deviant by representing intimate and affirming acts of sex; and (2) a challenge to boundaries of belonging as it couches these depictions within reflections on its actors’ understandings of their neighborhood and place within its community.

Author Biography

  • Robert LaRue, Moravian University

    Robert LaRue is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at Moravian University and currently directs the univer-sity’s Africana Studies program. His work addresses the intersec-tions of sexual, racial, gendered, and (inter)national difference. He has published on topics ranging from queerness in the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to race and gender in Jordan Peele’s Get Out. Biography 

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Published

2023-12-01

Issue

Vol. 36 No. 2 (2023): Writing Sex

Section

Article

License

Copyright (c) 2023 Robert LaRue (Author)

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

How to Cite

LaRue, R. (2023). No Shame in this Queer Thang: Sex, Place, and Belonging in Charles Rice- González’s Chulito. FRAME, Journal of Literary Studies, 36(2), 21-38. https://platform.openjournals.nl/FRAME/article/view/26325