Country Queers

Abstract

Most representations of rural life depict the stories of straight, white American families, in some way or other. Rae Garringer is out to set the record straight. But, far from simply challenging the idea that rural areas are monolithic, Garringer and their editorial team are producing engaging and moving podcasts that offer much-needed opportunities to connect rural and small-town queer people with one another.Garringer's podcast Country Queers: The Podcast, which began in 2020 and began its second season in the fall of 2021, provides a vivid audio documentary of the diverse lives of queer, lesbian, gay, transgender, and bisexual people living in rural North America, highlighting voices across the intersections of race, class, age, ability, indigeneity, and religion. With content from the US Southwest to Canada, the podcast uplifts the diversity of queer life in the country, while talking about the joy, the challenges, and the collective experience of being queer in rural communities. However, since it is a project with Appalachian roots and origins, Appalachian audiences will certainly find substantial amounts of content about queer mountain life. Easily a third of the episodes include interviews with Appalachian voices, and many of those will be familiar to readers of this journal. From a tear-provoking interview with dearly departed community leader and former organizer at the Highlander Center, Elandria (or E) Williams, to a moving oral history with acclaimed east Kentucky writer Silas House, Garringer's podcast provides content that the region has yet to see. That is, this podcast directly engages with Appalachian queer life in its full breadth and dynamism, producing an important archive of Appalachian experience that is publicly available in an easily accessible and deeply care-filled manner.The project is also a useful example of public oral history scholarship. The podcasts are based on Garringer's growing archive of oral histories with queer people living in rural areas. Garringer began collecting interviews in 2013, now numbering over seventy oral histories in total, a project built into their studies in folklore and American studies at University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Experiences with the groups Staying Together Appalachian Youth (STAY) and Southerners on New Ground (SONG) also provided Garringer with the inspiration to make the project a reality.Coming to us from Garringer's home of Whitesburg, Kentucky, the podcast has the professional feel of Appalshop-trained producers. Garringer is one of those unique interviewers who is able to direct a conversation but also leave ample space and tenderness needed for these kinds of vulnerable and deeply personal stories. However, with crisp, high-quality editing, the podcast barely feels like an oral history archive. That may be due in part to the editorial team, including assistant editor Tommie Anderson, and the star-studded editorial advisory board: self-described “Xicana Queer Feminist mama” community organizer, Hermelinda Cortés; acclaimed journalist Lewis Raven Wallace; and scholar of queer black feminisms Dr. Sharon P. Holland, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A useful and important bonus is that in each episode, our host takes a break to ask white listeners with means to donate to various important rural Indigenous- and black-run organizing and community projects. A clear-visioned example of why the politics of representation matter, Country Queers is a compelling format for sharing the first of its kind archive of being queer in the country. Appalachian scholars and activists alike will get much out of listening to these vibrant and tender stories.