Language, gender and sexuality in 2021: hopeful futures amidst sound and fury

Abstract

This year-in-review addresses the way violence and civil unrest manifested intensely in 2021, at the two-year mark of the Covid-19 pandemic, by inspecting the local dramas various authors re-narrate through the lenses of gender, sexuality and their semiotic performances. Three focal points organise the literature recontextualised here. First is the study of the lingering effects of cisheteropatriarchy in different contexts. Second, while forging a diagnosis of the present, the texts reviewed here address ongoing practices that defy the persistent colonial gaze. Third, they propose future paths that follow the decolonial route now at the centre of language, gender and sexuality research. Overall, the works resonate with the sound of the past, the fury of the present and the hope for the future. While transitioning forward with actions set forth today, they reimagine colonial yesterdays. As such, they indicate the chronotopic mobility of power-resistance performances.