Jillian Deri

Love's Refraction: Jealousy and Compersion in Queer Women's Polyamorous Relationships Jillian Deri

Commendation Quotes: "Deri weaves together academic theory, past research, activist/community writing, and the voices of participants in a sophisticated, engaging, and accessible way. Love's Refraction is a pleasure to read." - Meg Barker, Department of Psychology, The Open UniversityCommendation Quotes: "Love's Refraction is a timely, innovative and exciting study of how lesbian, bisexual, or queer-identified women work through issues related to jealousy in polyamorous relations. This is a ground-breaking contribution to the cultural study of emotions and polyamory." - Christian Klesse, Department of Sociology, Manchester Metropolitan UniversityCommendation Quotes:"Interesting to read and delightfully approachable, Love's Refraction brings gender, power, emotions, and polyamory in to clear focus. Deri provides enough context that Love's Refraction will be useful to people who had previously known nothing about polyamory, while at the same time loading the book with such rich detail that it is well worth reading for even the most seasoned researcher of polyamory." - Elisabeth Sheff, PhD, author of 'The Polyamorists Next Door: Inside Multiple-Partner Relationships and Families'Table of Contents: Acknowledgments 1 But Don't You Get Jealous?2 Polyagony: An Exploration of Jealousy3 If You Move to the Rainforest, You've Got No Right to Complain about the Rain: From Polyagony to4 Once You Say, "I'm Poly," It Kind of Eliminates the Need for the Feminist Part: Gender, Jealousy, and Polyamory5 Jealousy Can Be Hot if You Flip It: Working and Playing with Power6 Polyamory's Legacy: Concluding RemarksWorks CitedIndexPublisher Marketing: Popular wisdom might suggest that jealousy is an inevitable outcome of non-monogamous relationships. In Love's Refraction, Jillian Deri explores the distinctive question of how and why polyamorists - people who practice consensual non-monogamy - manage jealousy. Her focus is on the polyamorist concept of "compersion" - taking pleasure in a lover's other romantic and sexual encounters. By discussing the experiences of queer, lesbian, and bisexual polyamorous women, Deri highlights the social and structural context that surrounds jealousy. Her analysis, making use of the sociology of emotion and feminist intersectionality theory, shows how polyamory challenges traditional emotional and sexual norms. Clear and concise, Love's Refraction speaks to both the academic and the polyamorous community. Deri lets her interviewees speak for themselves, linking academic theory and personal experiences in a sophisticated, engaging, and accessible way.

Contributor Bio:  Deri, Jillian Jillian Deri received her PhD in Sociology from Simon Fraser University.