'Words In Eli Clare's Exile And Pride'

From a young age we are taught the saying “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” While this may be helpful for grade school children that are being bullied by their peers, it has some problems as it trivializes the importance that words can have. The words that people choose for themselves, as well as the words that others ascribe to a person, have an unmeasurable importance to how people can understand themselves. These labels can be a significant source of oppression or liberation for many people who identify within them. In Eli Clare’s memoir, Exile and Pride, looks at the importance of words as he explores the labels he’s associated with. He does this through mixing discussion of the histories and modern representation

Queer. Exile. Class (Clare 31).” When Clare writes about losing home, he is writing about the parts of his identity that pulled him away from the place that he raised, as well as the parts of his identity that prevent him from finding home in other places (Clare 41). These words, queer, exile, and class, are both driving forces behind why Clare can’t find a place where he feels fully comfortable settling, but also these words give him a place where he feels at home. Clare explains his trouble finding home best when he describes, “I was a rural, mixed-class, queer child in a straight, rural, working-class town. Afterwards, I was an urban-transplanted, mixed-class, dyke activist in an urban, mostly middle-class, queer community. Occasionally I simply feel as if I’ve traded one displacement for another and lost home to boot (Clare 46).” This telling of Clare’s displacement highlights how his queer identity drove him from his childhood home, but his rural, mixed-class background prevents him from feeling content in the city (Clare 46). His queer identity, and his desire to escape his class situation, is part of what forced Clare into the exile that he experiences. However, these identities don’t only serve as a point of alienation for Clare but also as a place where he can belong. When talking

Through the discussion of terms such as supercrip and home, alongside discussion of labels that he chooses to accept or leave behind, Clare is able to analyze the way that he looks as his identities. Clare’s autobiography uses words and language as a tool to show that a person’s identities aren’t simply labels, but are ways to understand oneself, unite, and even find a place to