Master of Arts, Miami University, 2019, English

Coming out is widely understood as a crucial, repeated scene of a queer person making their queerness known to others. Rather than consider coming out in film as one specific cinematic moment, I argue that the means by which queerness is made legible to the spectator constitutes coming out, even if that coming out is preceded by an outing or occurs non-verbally. Engaging with the speech act theories of J.L. Austin and queer theories of Judith Butler, I trace the performative differences between coming out and outing speech acts in the films The Children's Hour (1961) and Love, Simon (2018), arguing that outing creates an instable queer subject that must be made coherent through coming out. I also examine how the cinematic apparatus can either construct a closet or allow for non-verbal coming out in Brokeback Mountain (2005) and God's Own Country (2017), creating a uniquely non-identitarian approach to coming out. The divergent endings met by queer characters in these four films further demonstrate how the process and aftermath of coming out play a role in narrative conclusion, establishing coming out as one of the most critically important aspects of a queer film.

Committee: Katie Johnson Dr. (Advisor); Elisabeth Hodges Dr. (Committee Member); Anita Mannur Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Film Studies