“What is the effect of receiving something from someone who is not your biological kin?” Anthropologist Delwar Hussain introduces his new project on Queer Inheritance, born when a friend welcomed Delwar and his partner to enjoy items belonging to her late uncle – a man they had never met. This led Delwar to wonder: how are queer people today preparing for their deaths? How, with this in mind, can we think of “inheritance”? And what does the “good death”, of which inheritance is a key part, mean to queer people?
While the word “inheritance” often leads us to thoughts of taxation and legislation, class and inequality, finance and family feuds, this episode heads in a different direction. Reflecting on both physical items, but also those things that remain intangible and untaxable – wisdom, life stories, mentorship, communion – this conversation unites two classic areas of anthropological thought: kinship and the gift. Inheritance, Delwar reminds us – particularly at the peak of the HIV/AIDS crisis, for example, and when homosexuality was illegal in countries like the UK – can be a radical and communicative act. At other times, it reproduces dominant norms, among them heteronormativity and the privileging of biological kin. And then there’s disinheritance, too…
A fascinating and exploratory conversation about family, choice, meaning and death. Plus: the enduring popularity of Kath Weston’s “Families We Choose”.
Guest: Delwar Hussain; Hosts: George Kalivis, Alexis Hieu Truong; Executive Producer: Alice Bloch; Sound Engineer: David Crackles; Music: Joe Gardner; Artwork: Erin Aniker
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Episode Resources
By Delwar Hussain
- ‘Just who do I leave my worldly possessions to, darling?’: A Study of Queer Inheritance – research project funded by a Wellcome Accelerator Award
- Boundaries Undermined: The Ruins of Progress on the Bangladesh/India Border (2013)
- Delwar’s profile at The University of Edinburgh
From the Sociological Review Foundation
- Uncommon Sense episodes: Love & Reproduction, with Alva Gotby (2025); Performance, with Kareem Khubchandani (2023); Desire, with Angelique Nixon (2025)
- Discover our lesson plans for use in the classroom!
Further resources
- “Families We Choose” – Kath Weston
- “The Gift” – Marcel Mauss
- “Forgetting Family” – Jack Halberstam, in “A Companion to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Studies”
- “How to Survive a Plague” – David France
- “Abolish the Family” – Sophie Lewis
- “Anthropology and Inheritance” – Current Anthropology special issue featuring the pieces by João Biehl, Adam T. Smith and Tim Ingold, mentioned by Delwar
Read more about the work of Judith Butler and Resto Cruz.
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