Dignity is almost universally viewed as something to aspire to. However, dignity can often be an isolating concept that drives people apart, negatively affecting societies as a whole. Stephen M. Engel and Timothy S. Lyle’s Disrupting Dignity: Rethinking Power and Progress in LGBTQ Lives offers readers a better and more nuanced understanding of the concept of dignity and the role that it plays in the day-to-day life of our world’s LGBTQ+ citizens. This book is centered around the concept of dignity and how it is not always a good thing. Moreover, the book demonstrates that, in many cases, dignity is a tool of the state that is used to shame and disempower members of the LGBTQIA+ community. Disrupting Dignity is divided into two parts: part one focuses on the power of dignity to affect the lives of people living in the United States from the perspective of public health, while part two focuses on the promotion of sameness and also the embracing of difference in popular culture representations. This work gives ample examples of politicians, policymakers, media leaders, and people within the LGBTQ community who invoke the concept of dignity in a harmful manner.

            Engel and Lyle’s main argument is that over time, dignity has become a tool of the state and marketplace, and while viewed as liberating, dignity is actually very limiting. They begin their argument by illustrating the United States government’s degradation of queer kinship and identity by the forced closure of bathhouses and other LGBTQ+ community spaces during the beginning of the AIDS crisis. They move to talk about more modern representations of deployments of dignity, including within dating applications, and media/propaganda representations. The authors argue that “dignity–as it has been developed in the United States to consolidate and amplify heteronormative and neoliberal logics–comes with costs for certain bodies and for particular alternative ways of worldmaking” (Engel and Lyle 25). Their critique of dignity continues to claim that the construction of dignity severs humans from the potential of queer worldmaking, and the fostering of important community-building opportunities such as queer kinship and an open dialogue around queer history.

            Stephen M. Engel is a Professor of Politics at Bates College in Lewiston, ME, and is also associated with the American Bar Foundation. His most famous work is titled Fragmented Citizens: The Changing Landscape of Gay and Lesbian Lives, and was published in 2016 (Engel). His main research focus is on American political development and social movements, especially those concerning LGBTQIA+ socio-political and legal mobilization.

            Timothy S. Lyle is an Assistant Professor of English at Iona College in New Rochelle, NY. Some of their other work has been published in journals such as Callaloo, College Language Association Journal, MELUS, and African American Review (Lyle).Their main research focus is on African American literature and culture, queer theory, and disability. Lyle’s most recently published work is about HIV/AIDS narratives post-1995, and their upcoming book talks about HIV/AIDS through the lenses of pleasure and the intersections between race, gender, sexuality, and disability.

            In the introduction, Engel and Lyle define dignity and neoliberalism and present the questions that their piece seeks to answer. Their questions inquire about the usage of the word dignity: How has the word been used? Who has used it? What are their intentions? They also seek to understand how the word has been used positively and negatively by LGBTQ+-identifying people. In defining dignity, Engel and Lyle acknowledge that it is illogical to create a single definition for the concept of dignity, and rather, to acknowledge that the word has numerous meanings, and is demonstrated in many different ways through public policy, law, and popular culture. Finally, they define neoliberalism as a construct that “promotes equality to mean sameness. As such, it aligns with a definition of dignity as respectability” (8).  

            In Part 1, the focus is on the politics of public health policy. Engel and Lyle discuss bathhouse closures and the destruction of queer community during the early AIDS crisis, and demonstrate the efforts of state municipalities to “develop a notion of dignity that is associated with specific kinds of sexual behaviors” (19). Prior to this time period, bathhouses were a community gathering space for primarily gay men, and they were one of the few public symbols of pride and visibility for the gay community in the 1980’s during the post-Stonewall Era. Amidst the AIDS crisis, we see the mobilization of some members of the LGBTQ+ community to attempt to educate others about safe sex in order to prevent the outbreak from progressing further. Additionally, this section discusses modern geolocative social media applications, bathhouses, and HIV/AIDS prevention strategies such as Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP). Although it is somewhat brief and perhaps underdeveloped, they also attempt to discuss the intersection between race, class, and homosexuality and how that is relevant to users of bathhouses.

            In Part 2, Engel and Lyle bring in several contemporary media representations that somehow deal with the concept of dignity. First, they discuss Love, Simon, a 2018 film that they say “reflects and reproduces a hegemonic conception of neoliberal dignity that understands dignified behavior as restrained behavior” (119). In other words, the authors claim that Love, Simon deals with concepts of queer identity and sexuality as individual issues, thereby ignoring the importance of queer kinship and community as established in Part 1. Equally importantly, they state that Love, Simon ignores queer history, which is damaging to society as a whole. Second, Engel and Lyle discuss the 2018 TV show Pose. They effectively illustrate that this show “bolsters a value system of its own,” rather than employing the neoliberal dignity that results in individualism, erasure of history, and lack of community that we see in Love, Simon.

            In Part 3, the authors critically examine the United States Supreme Court’s (SCOTUS) deployment of dignity in a legal context. First, they discuss Kennedy and how conservative SCOTUS members have “adopt[ed] dignity to curb the aspirations of the political left, which has been at the forefront of LGBTQ+ rights advocacy” (258). They continue to claim that this employment of dignity is dismissive of the social complexities of gender and sexuality that exist in our society. Second, they propose alternative ways of looking at dignity, and whether the concept can actually be re-invented, or if it is too late. They bring in several cases from Justice Anthony Kennedy to illustrate that a reckoning with the white supremacy that has riddled our ‘justice’ system is essential to move forward. In the conclusion, Engel and Lyle summarize their main claim: the deployment of dignity comes at a cost for some bodies, and therefore, a critical intervention which includes analyzing the effects of dignity is essential.

            One key strength of Engel and Lyle’s work is that they effectively analyze the difference between multicultural casting and multicultural representation in media such as movies and TV shows. For example, they explain that in Love, Simon, there are BIPOC casted, yet their individual and community stories and histories are not addressed. In contrast, Pose includes a diverse cast, and the show is centered around the community and history of its characters.

            On the other hand, a weakness of this monograph is that is not accessibly written. For example, in order to understand Part 2, readers need a substantial amount of background knowledge of Love, Simon and Pose in order to understand any of the points, as the chapters are entirely structured around these media representations. While there is some background information provided, it is not sufficient for those who have not seen the program. Therefore, this monograph is not accessible to all, as not everyone has seen these pieces.

            In conclusion, this monograph was intellectually stimulating and effectively critiqued the concept of dignity overall. While there were parts that were inaccessible, it was easy to understand the basis of the critique of dignity. This would be a good read for a student who is engaging in conversations around criticisms of societal norms: an anthropology or gender and sexuality studies student. Regardless of who reads this monograph, they will be left questioning their own use of the word ‘dignity.’

Works Cited

Engel, Stephen M. Stephen M. Engel, https://www.bates.edu/faculty-expertise/profile/stephen-m-engel/.

Engel, Stephen M., and Timothy S. Lyle. Disrupting Dignity: Rethinking Power and Progress in LGBTQ Lives. Edited by Susan Burgess and Heath Fogg Davis, New York University Press, 2021.

Lyle, Timothy S. “Timothy S. Lyle.” Iona College, https://www.iona.edu/faculty/lyle-timothy. Accessed 20 Oct. 2021.