MICHAEL O'ROURKE, BA (NUI), MLitt (NUI)
I am a Research Affiliate in the Centre for the Interdisciplinary Study of Sexuality and Gender in Europe at the University
of Exeter, UK
I am also a Research Associate in the Somatechnics Research Centre at Macquarie University, New South Wales, Australia
CONTACT
RESEARCH INTERESTS
Intersections between queer theory and continental philosophy; critical theory; history of sexuality; gothic fiction;
disability studies.
I hold a first class honours BA in Mode One English, and a first class MLitt in Old and Middle English Language and Literature
for a thesis entitled 'Queering the Pardoner'. I am currently completing a PhD thesis entitled 'A Passion for the Impossible:
Waiting for the Queer Theory To-Come' on queer theory, continental philosophy and futurity focusing particularly on Jacques
Derrida, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, Luce Irigaray, Judith Butler, Michel Foucault, John Caputo and Jean Luc Nancy.
With Noreen Giffney, I established the Dublin Queer Studies Group in 2001 and have been organising The(e)ories: Advanced
Seminars for Queer Research with her since 2002, speakers at which have included Tamsin Wilton, Calvin Thomas, Patricia MacCormack,
Judith Halberstam, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick and Judith Butler. I have convened four international conferences, 'Queer Men: Historicising
Queer Masculinities, 1550-1800' (with Katherine O'Donnell in July 2001); 'Queer Romanticisms' (with David Collings in August
2003); 'Queer Keywords' (in April 2005) and FUTURE*QUEER (with Noreen Giffney in July 2006), as well as various roundtables,
symposia and panels at conferences in Ireland and abroad.
I am the series editor of the Queer Interventions book series at Ashgate Press and the Cultural Connections: Key Thinkers
and Queer Theory book series at the University of Wales Press with Noreen Giffney. I sit on the editorial board of Rhizomes:
Cultural Studies in Emerging Knowledge and am a member of the Queer(y)ing Psychology Collective in London and the
Deleuze Studies Network at Manchester Metropolitan University.
I taught in the School of English and Drama at University College Dublin, Ireland from September 1996 to September 2006
on a variety of topics including the history of the English language, Old and Middle English language and literature, Old
English grammar, Henry James' short fiction, the gothic novel from Walpole to Brite, queer film, the history of sexuality
and Shakespeare. I was also a Research Associate in film and queer theory in the Women's Education, Research and Resource
Centre (WERRC) for a number of years.
PUBLICATIONS
(1) BOOK SERIES
Queer Interventions Book Series (Ashgate Press) edited with Noreen Giffney.
Cultural Connections: Key Thinkers and Queer Theory Book Series (University of Wales Press; distributed by the University
of Chicago Press) edited with Noreen Giffney.
(2) BOOKS AND JOURNAL ISSUES
Love, Sex, Intimacy and Friendship
Between Men, 1550-1800 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003; paperback edtn. 2007) edited with Katherine O'Donnell.
Queer Masculinities, 1550-1800: Siting Same/Sex Desire in the Early Modern World (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006)
edited with Katherine O'Donnell.
The Ashgate Research Companion to Queer Theory (Ashgate Press, 2008)
edited with Noreen Giffney.
Derrida and Queer Theory, a collection of essays (in progress, forthcoming Palgrave
Macmillan).
'Queer Methodologies and/or Queers in Medieval Studies: Where Are We Now?', a special issue of Medieval Feminist
Forum, 28 (2003).
'The Becoming-Deleuzoguattarian of Queer Studies', a special double issue of Rhizomes: Cultural Studies in Emerging
Knowledge, 11/12 (2005/2006).
'Queer Romanticism', a special double issue of Romanticism on the Net, 36/37(2004/2005) edited with David Collings.
'Jacques
Ranciere on the Shores of Queer Theory', a special issue of Borderlands (in progress, forthcoming) edited with Samuel
A. Chambers.
(3) ARTICLES AND BOOK CHAPTERS
'Queer Men: Historicising Queer Masculinities, 1500-1800' in The History Review, 12 (2001).
'In Memoriam - Alan Bray (1948-2001)' in Katherine O'Donnell and Michael O'Rourke (eds.), Love, Sex, Intimacy and
Friendship Between Men, 1550-1800 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003).
'Becoming (Queer) Medieval' in Medieval Feminist Forum, 28 (2003).
'Introduction: Siting Queer Masculinities' in Katherine O'Donnell and Michael O'Rourke (eds.), Queer Masculinities,
1550-1800: Siting Same/Sex Desire in the Early Modern World (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006).
'Queer Romanticisms: Past, Present and Future' (with David Collings) in Romanticism on the Net, 36/37 (2004/2005).
'On the Eve of a Queer-Straight Future: Notes Toward an Antinormative Heteroerotic' in Feminism & Psychology,
15, no. 1 (2005).
'Queer Theory's Loss and the Work of Mourning Jacques Derrida' in Rhizomes: Cultural Studies in Emerging Knowledge,
10 (2005).
'The Roguish Future of Queer Studies' in Journal of Queer Studies in Finland, 2 (2006).
'What's So Queer about the Queer Theory To-Come?' (in Portugese) in Revista Critica de Ciencias Sociais (Critical
Journal of Social Sciences) (2006).
'Quempire: A Loiterly Journal into the Heart of Darkness' (with Jonathan Mitchell) in Murat Ayedemir (ed.),
Indiscretions: At the Intersection of Postcolonial and Queer Theory (Rodopi, 2008).
'The Q Word' (with Noreen Giffney) in Noreen Giffney and Michael O'Rourke (eds.), The Ashgate Research Companion
to Queer Theory (Ashgate Press, 2008).
'The "E(ve)" in The(e)ories: Dreamreading Sedgwick in Retrospective Time' (with Noreen Giffney) in Irish
Feminist Review, 3 (2007).
(4) SERIES EDITORS' PREFACES
'After Shame' with Noreen Giffney, in Sally R. Munt, Queer Attachments: The
Cultural Politics of Shame (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007).
'For the Love of Cinema' with Noreen Giffney, in Patricia
MacCormack, Cinesexuality (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008).
'The Open', in Noreen Giffney and Myra J. Hird (eds.),
Queering the Non/Human (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008).
(5) REVIEWS
Review of Tison Pugh, Queering Medieval Genres and Anna Klosowska, Queer Love in the Middle Ages for
The Sixteenth Century Journal: The Journal of Early Modern Studies (2006).
Review of Richard Fantina (ed.), Straight Writ Queer: Non-Normative Expressions of Heterosexuality in Literature
for South Atlantic Review (2007).
Review of Robert McRuer, Crip Theory: Cultural Signs of Queerness and Disability for Archives of Sexual
Behaviour (2008).
Review of Jarlath Killeen, Gothic Ireland: Horror and the Irish Anglican Imagination in the Long Eighteenth Century
for Irish University Press (forthcoming 2006).
Review of Didier Eribon, Insult and the Making of the Gay Self for Sexualities (2006).
Review of Carl F. Stychin, Governing Sexuality: The Changing Politics of Citizenship and Law Reform for Gay
Scotland Magazine; reprinted in SCOLAG (Scottish Legal Action Group) Legal Journal, 316 (2004).
Review of Mohmin Rahman, Sexuality and Democracy: Identities and Strategies in Lesbian and Gay Politics for
Gay Scotland Magazine (2003).
Review of Steven F. Kruger and Glenn Burger (eds.), Queering the Middle Ages for South Atlantic Review,
68, no. 2 (2003).
'Anal-yzing Gone Wilde', Review of Richard Halpern,
Shakespeare's Perfume: Sodomy and Sublimity in the Sonnets, Wilde,
Freud and Lacan for
The OSCHOLARS, 3, no. 1 (2003) URL
http://homepages.gold.ac.uk/oscholars/
(6) INTERVIEW
'Delboy' (with Noreen Giffney), an interview with Del LaGrace Volcano in Gay Community News (February 2005).
INTERNATIONAL EDITORIAL BOARD
Rhizomes: Cultural Studies in Emerging Knowledge
PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS
The Queer(y)ing Psychology Collective, Open University, Milton Keynes, UK.
Deleuze Studies Network, English Research Institute, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK.
The BABEL Working Group, Southern Illinois University, USA.
CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS & INVITED LECTURES
I have presented conference papers and delivered invited lectures at University College Dublin, Ireland; University of
Sussex, UK; Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick, Ireland; University of Birmingham, UK; University of Newcastle
Upon Tyne, UK; National University of Ireland, Cork, Ireland; University of Dublin, Trinity College, Ireland; Irish Film Institute
(IFI), Dublin, Ireland; Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada; University of Leeds, UK; Christ's College, Cambridge,
UK; Outhouse LGBT Community Centre, Dublin, Ireland; Open University, Milton Keynes, UK; King's College, University of London,
UK; Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, UK; University of Wales, Aberystwyth, UK; National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Ireland;
University of Portsmouth, UK; and University of Wales, Swansea, UK. His papers have been presented by other scholars at City
University of New York Graduate Centre (CUNY), USA; and the University of California, Los Angeles, USA.
