Language plays a crucial role in exploring, constructing, and communicating one’s identity. This may be even more prevalent if one’s identity diverges from hetero- and cisnormative expectations. The present paper thus assumes that especially for young queer people, communicating aspects of their identity online is highly important, as also confirmed by e.g., Jones (2019), Crowley (2022).

In this first case study, we will start exploring the issue of language use in communicating one’s queer identity. For this purpose, we will investigate 6 YouTube videos containing coming-out narratives of a broad spectrum of queer YouTubers (asexual, bisexual, homosexual (gay and lesbian), transgender, and non-binary speakers). Our analysis will make use of critical / positive discourse analysis (as successfully applied by Bruns, under review) as well as appraisal theory (cf. Martin & White 2005) in order to answer the following set of research questions:

1.     Which common features and structures exist between the coming out videos? Are there ‘genre-defining’ moves (cf. Swales 1990)? Are there differences concerning the communication of sexual identities vs. gender identities (cf. also Zimman 2009)?

2.     What kind of appraisal strategies are used by the YouTubers in order to (subliminally) evaluate their own identity as well as their coming-out experience?

3.     What type of evaluation is ascribed to the role of friends, family, as well as the online community and society at large in respect to their coming-out experience?

In our analysis, we will provide a qualitative analysis of recurrent topics and how they are construed. Further, we will extract significant linguistic patterns and markers important for appraisal and identity construction (e.g., adjectives, hedges, boosters, person reference).

Our first results indicate that common features of coming-out narratives can be identified, such as pre-coming out background story, subordinated every-day narratives, and before-after comparisons. We can furthermore find evidence for differences between sexuality-related coming out and gender-related coming out, with the latter often having more negatively evaluated aspects to their narrative and mentioning more dramatic consequences. We may assume two reasons for this contrast: firstly, the more global role gender plays for one’s overall identity compared to sexuality, and secondly, the role mainstream society plays, with its greater stigmatization of transgender and non-binary identities.

References

Bruns, H. (under review). “That’s all it takes to be trans” – Counter-strategies to hetero- and transnormative discourse on YouTube. International Journal of the Sociology of Language.

Crowley, A. (2022). Language ideologies and legitimacy among nonbinary YouTubers. Journal of Language and Sexuality, 11(2), 165–189.

Jones, L. (2019). Discourses of transnormativity in vloggers’ identity construction. International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 256, 85–101.

Martin, J. R. & White, P. R. R. (2005). The language of evaluation: Appraisal in English. London: Palgrave Macmillan. 

Swales, J. M. (1990). Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Zimman, L. (2009). ‘The other kind of coming out’: Transgender people and the coming out narrative genre. Gender and Language, 3(1), 53–80.