Perfect Union?
On June 26, 2015, Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy declared same-sex marriage "is so ordered" across the United States. The day will no doubt be remembered as a landmark shift in how U.S. society views and validates marriage and romantic relationships. But the shift would not have happened without an arguably more important, but already forgotten, shift four years earlier that saw unprecedented movement in public attitudes alongside record amounts of television representation of LGBQ relationships. Situated at this intersection of legislative, attitudinal and representational change, A Perfect Union? presents analyses of popular programmes such as Modern Family, Grey’s Anatomy, The Good Wife, Glee, Desperate Housewives and House in order to tackle crucial ethical questions regarding the impact of heterosexual knowledges on the rendering of same-sex relationships as relatable and "respectable" – portraits of heteronormativity that reproduce the masculine/feminine binary, monogamous coupledom and the raising of children. Focusing on the connection between heteronormativity and government legitimacy, Cory Albertson deftly examines television’s privileging of certain forms of relationships over others, shedding light on the reproduction of everyday power relations within LGBQ relationships that hinge on issues of race, sexuality, class and gender. An engaging study of media constructions of same-sex relationships and the shaping of public expectations and attitudes, A Perfect Union? is a must-read for scholars of sociology, media and cultural studies and popular culture with interests in gender, sexuality and the family.
Cory Albertson is Visiting Lecturer in the Department of Sociology at Smith College, USA.