ABSTRACT
Ranging in scope from widely popular women’s memoirs to academic research in the social sciences and humanities, conceptualizations of an “Iranian diaspora” have flourished in the past couple of decades, particularly in the United States. In this chapter, I argue for the critical value of a queer diasporic analytical lens that disengages the idea of an “Iranian Diaspora” from concerns over authenticity and belonging and instead, through an analysis of diasporic Iranian women’s memoirs, situates it within future possibilities for the creative expression of kinship and intimacy. I begin by justifying the vitality of a queer intervention on Iranian diaspora studies that questions the divisive concerns over authenticity as well as looks for opportunities to construct new relationships outside of an exclusive connection to a rooted idea of belonging. I will then apply such a lens to critically consider a recent popular memoir within this genre, Jasmin Darznik’s The Good Daughter (2011). When viewed through the de-normalizing and de-stabilizing framework of a queer diaspora lens, the text provides an opportunity to challenge conventionally held understandings of gender, nation, narration, and home, and suggests new opportunities for building community through the intimate sharing of experiences. I contrast such a frame with examples of more conventional, Orientalist readings of the book, gleaned through reader responses of the book on the Amazon and Goodreads online review pages. As such, I argue that the strength in a queer diaspora methodology of re-reading texts lies in its questioning of the assumed coherence of authenticity, gender, nation, and home, and its construction of a relationship with the past that suggests possibilities for the future. By offering a new reading of popular texts, this approach presents a critical, anti-Orientalist methodology that simultaneously opens up new ways of building relationships within diasporic experiences.
