Introduction: Schools as queer transformative spaces

This chapter introduces the key themes and questions to be addressed throughout the book. It introduces salient aspects of the social, political, historical and economic context relating to the research presented in the chapters appearing in the volume. The chapter presents the rationale for producing the book. The introduction then outlines the theoretical underpinnings of chapters in the volume which are all informed by queer theory and/or critical feminist theories, with additional insights from psychological, sociological and linguistic perspectives. Specific attention is paid to the utilisation of feminist and queer theories in conceptualisations of space and place in which it is argued that space has the potential to be ‘queered’ through the performative enactment of non-heteronormative identities, desires and practices. We develop this argument by suggesting that schools, as both physical and ideological ‘spaces’, can be queered in ways which open up a range of possibilities for enacting gender and sexual identities, the result of which is a positively transformative social and learning experience for all students. The chapter explains how each of the subsequent chapters will exemplify such process through presenting empirical research which is informed by these theories of queer transformative space