sigh. i don't mean this at all to sound condescending when i say i'd very much like to sit down with kimberly and saidiya hartman and pat parker and just have a nice little chat about things while taking turns playing street fighter. i can only imagine what it's like teaching the aggies, so i guess i should find it assuring if this is a reflection of a curriculum she actually teaches from which will force her students to read about angela davis, at least before they go off to become an officer somewhere in the armed forces. given that, i'm stuck between coming to a decision as to whether it is better for them to receive these subjects here rather than having them handled more properly elsewhere. i feel set up by the title of this book. why would i not want to read something with that title? although my expectations were not met, as the definition of "diva"ќ here lives in a world blithely free of such things as queers, transpeople and gender non-conforming folks, etc. its interesting how in the introduction she righteously reads wayne kostenbaum for purportedly not firsthand experiencing the power of being read by a drag queen, yet throughout the book fleshes what more or less operates as a moderately kinder yet nevertheless stubborn black nationalistic feel, what with its devotion to a precise gender binary. though i sound troubled, don't let me leave you thinking that i didn't at all appreciate what she was being done here, especially if she did so at the horrible texas academic institution i've alluded to. but oh my god, how did i ever make it through her chapter about essence magazine? this is a book i would feel safe giving to a person who has never seen a black person before, believing that them coming away with the idea that "blackness"ќ can be effectively categorized and known is qualitatively better than them not ever have heard of blackness at all.