On being oriented: Strengthening transgressive orientations in transdisciplinary sustainability research through queer theory

Abstract

We move from a provocative analogy: that transdisciplinary sustainability researchers are to academia what queer people are to a heteronormative and sex/gender binary world. Both may experience disorientation and need to learn how to transgress established norms. Queer people and scholars have extensively dealt with (dis)orientation and celebrated transgression. We suggest that queer theory can help transdisciplinary sustainability researchers to raise questions that intensify the transgressive orientations of their work when contributing to just and equitable sustainability transformations.