Sociology
What does it mean to be queer in Italy today? What are the forms, languages and forms of resistance used to construct and assert one’s identity in a context that is still largely heteronormative? Queer e ora explores queerness as knowledge, experience and representation, questioning the critical and transformative potential of sexual identity from a non-conformist perspective. Through a series of interviews – with Nicoz Balboa, Anas Chariai, Jean Philippe Porcu Duffresne (aka DJ Lil’ Jean), Nicola Gardini, Dani Martiri, Piergiorgio Pardo, Antonio Pizzo, Gianni “GianOrso” Rauso, Giuseppe Vincenzo Sciarra, Anna Segre, Piero Toto, Fabio Vittorini, Giovanna Cristina Vivinetto, and Andrea Zardi – the book highlights a choral dialogue that reflects on the political nature of being queer, the risk of assimilation into mainstream discourse, and the urgency of new narratives. A polyphonic map that, starting from the present, attempts to imagine what it might mean to call oneself queer in the future that awaits us.
Synopsis source: Mimesisedizioni.it
Publication date: 12 September 2025
Gian Pietro Leonardi is an Italian researcher and literary critic specialising in gender studies and LGBTQ+ literature. He is the founder of the Queerographies project, dedicated to promoting and mapping contemporary Italian queer fiction. He has published essays such as L’arte del desiderio (The Art of Desire) and works as a translator and editorial curator. He actively participates in the cultural debate on identity, desire and representation in the arts.
Giancarlo Covella is a lecturer and researcher at the University of Bergamo, where he teaches translation, English language and comparative literature. His research interests include queer studies, ballroom culture and the representation of identities in the arts and media. He has published academic essays and the book Dickens e il realismo ottocentesco (Dickens and Nineteenth-Century Realism). He also collaborates with the CIELS language mediation school in Brescia.
