Queer Imag(in)ing: Liminality as Resistance in Lindqvist's Let the Right One In

Abstract

This essay explores queer imag(in)ing by analyzing a contemporary vampire text, Let The Right One In, by John Ajvide Lindqvist. As I argue, the rhetorical act of humanizing vampires is inherently limiting for (queer) audiences and indicative of processes that seek to clarify, assimilate, and tame—in short, normalize, which as Michel Foucault states “imposes homogeneity” by stamping out difference. Furthermore, I argue that a text can actively resist moments of normalization with the strategic use of what Victor Turner calls liminality—a (queer) rhetorical tactic that resists while seemingly/simultaneously buttressing a liberal humanist belief wherein difference is denied thus displacing and denying the significance of the Other.