Affect and queer intimate entanglements in national-neoliberal Estonia

Abstract

This article examines the affective entanglements and queer/ed intimacies in post-Soviet Estonia by analyzing ethnographic fieldwork. To build an intersectionally engaged analysis, the article employs Karen Barad’s agential realist model of intra-actions to show how intimate relationships are tied to socio-economic status and cultural setting. In Estonia, intimacy is framed by a homophobic discourse that erases anything but heteronormativity. This public erasure produces, on the one hand, moral panics and, on the other hand, affectively complex intimate entanglements among queer/ed subjects. The empirical analysis discusses conversations with five straight and queer women that contain rich affective narratives. It investigates how a person’s economic situation relates to their intimate relationship choice in a social sphere that is dominated by nationalist discourse and neoliberal rationality. This has created contradictory affective responses that are unpacked and contextualized in the article.