Pembroke Center

Isaac Essex (they/he) is a PhD student in the American Studies Department. They work in trans studies, decolonial environmental humanities, and aesthetics and visual culture, to think through queer and trans endurance amid hostile climates, extractive economies, and ecological precarity. His work is particularly interested in what it means to be queer and have bad feelings, how to move through them, and how to find common places for persistence. Of late, they have been thinking with the notion of 'weathering' as it refers to the act of endurance that is being worn down, and the attempts to withstand atmospheric pressure that foster modes of survival amid a climate of hostility. Isaac holds a B.A. in English and Gender Studies from the University of Pennsylvania, and an M.A. in English from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. His critical and creative work has been published or is forthcoming in such places as Transgender Studies Quarterly, Apiary, PANK Magazine, and Journal of Lesbian Studies.