FALL 2012 news CTHE CENTERL F OR ALESBIANG AN D G A YS STUDIE S

THE G RADUA TE C E N TER | THE CIT Y UNIVERSI T Y O F NE W Y ORK

UPCOMING EVENTS

Radically Gay: The Life and Visionary Legacy of Harry Hay “Performing Que(e)ries” - New Queer Performance Series Book Launch - Born This Way: Real Stories of Growing Up Gay Seminars in the City: Queering the Frame

CLAGS UPDATES

Events and Outreach Development, Memberships and Fellowships International Resource Network

FEATURING

Interviews with Martin Duberman and Paul Vitagliano Lambda Literary Awards Fall Events Calendar MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG

James Wilson CLAGS Executive Director

As I complete my first year as CLAGS Execu- by church pastors and government officials, without saying, each element required a tive Director, all I can think is what a ride it was comforting to have a bit of really good good deal of time, effort, and care from the it has been. The summer break has allowed news for a change. The inevitable backlash participants, organizers, CLAGS staff mem- some time to put the clutch in neutral, idle, followed, and the cacophonous noise in- bers, and our friends at the Graduate Center. and look back on the trip. Hindsight can let cluded the usual chorus of mean-spirited On behalf of the CLAGS Board, I would like to one enjoy the view, appreciate the mostly talkshow hosts, all-but forgotten Hollywood express our enormous gratitude. smooth drive, and occasionally say, “Wow! personalities (Kirk Cameron, anyone?), and That was a close one.” the voices of political and religious doom. Looking ahead, the itinerary seems even more ambitious. Just around the corner we First, the “close one”: We ended last year While this debate—including the accompa- have a major conference celebrating the life in an extremely precarious financial posi- nying and often cynical probing of the timing and legacies of Harry Hay. Along the way, tion with our grants all but dried up and our of the President’s announcement—played we have a book launch, a series on queer funding drastically cut. The Board, the staff, itself out in the blink-of-an-eye news cycle, performance in the twenty-first century, a and our incredibly generous donors and CLAGS was rolling along, committing our seminars-in-the-city focused on queer arts members rallied, and we entered the spring few resources and talented labor to helping throughout the city, and our fall culminates term bolstered and ready to dig in and face teachers refine and develop queer curricula, in the presentation of the Kessler Award new (and some of the same old) challenges. sharing cutting-edge scholarship on gen- to historian, playwright, activist (and did I And what a spring it was. der and sexualities, and hosting roundtable mention CLAGS’s founder?) Martin Duber- discussions on LGBT history, activism, and man. I can assure you that the CLAGS office In May we were heartened, of course, by the arts. Those events and initiatives are is buzzing with activity in preparation for our President Obama’s statement of support for described at some length in the following ambitious fall calendar. same-sex marriage. In the midst of continu- pages, and I hope that even though we have ing coverage of LGBT teen suicide, votes to the space to provide the briefest snapshots, Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a heck amend state constitutions thereby limiting we are able to convey the richness of the of a ride. LGBT rights, and threats to the physical well- spring programming. While it probably goes being of presumed LGBT children and adults TABLE OF CONTENTS Page 3 Page

CLAGS STAFF CLAGS BOARD MEMBERS 5 Page

JAMES WILSON EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR CLAGS FOUNDER James Wilson is Professor of English and Theatre at LaGuardia Community College and the Graduate Center Martin Duberman, Distinguished Professor of History, Lehman College and The Graduate Center (CUNY) of the City University of New York. Areas of research include queer theatre and performance, African American theatre, and pedagogy. His articles have appeared in Urban Education, Teaching English in the Two-Year College, and Theatre History Studies. His essay, “’Ladies and Gentlemen, People Die’: The Uncomfortable CLAGS BOARD OF DIRECTORS INTRODUCTIONS & RECOGNITIONS Performances of Kiki and Herb,” appeared in an anthology of lesbian and gay theatre and performances in Fall 2008. He is co-editor of The Journal of American Drama and Theatre, which is published by the Martin E. Chair: Jennifer Gaboury, Political Jeffrey Escoffier, Independent Scholar Christopher Adam Mitchell, History Theatre Segal Center (CUNY Graduate Center). His book, Bulldaggers, Pansies, and Chocolate Babies: Race, CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS

Science and Women’s and Gender Stud- Department, Rutgers University-New Performance, and Sexuality in the Harlem Renaissance, was published by University of Michigan Press in James Green, History Department, Brown ies, Hunter College, CUNY Brunswick 2010, and a paperback version was made available in 2011. University Jason Baumann, Coordinator of Collection Jen Mitchell, English Department, The RUSTEM ERTUG ALTINAY GLOBAL COORDINATOR FOR IRN Daniel Hurewitz, History Department, Assessment and LGBT Collections, New Graduate Center, CUNY Rüstem Ertug Altınay is the general coordinator and the Middle East regional coordinator of the International Hunter College, CUNY York Public Library Resource Network (IRN). Under the IRN, he isalso coordinating the Turkey’s Queer Lives oral history project Alyssa Nitchun, Creative Time Neil Meyer, English Department, The Letter from the Executive Officer and the Transnational Peer Review Network for research on Middle Eastern sexualities. Ertug is a Ph.D. Matt Brim, English Department, College candidate in the Department of Performance Studies at New York University. His main area of research is Graduate Center, CUNY Angelique V. Nixon, Women’s Studies, of Staten Island, CUNY gender, sexuality and body politics in Turkey. His work appeared in academic journals including Women’s University of Connecticut Studies Quarterly, Feminist Media Studies, the International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics, and the Journal of Women’s History as well as various edited volumes. Ertug is also the project manager of the Istanbul-based theater company, Theater Painted Bird. INCOMING CLAGS BOARD MEMBERS Office Staff BENJAMIN GILLESPIE EVENTS AND OUTREACH COORDINATOR Michelle Billies is a Ph.D. candidate in the Randall Chamberlain is an immigration lawyer City focused on creating safe schools for LGBT Benjamin Gillespie is a Ph.D. student in Theatre at the CUNY Graduate Center. Benjamin holds an M.A. in Social-Personality Psychology program of CUNY in private practice, with a focus on immigration youth. In 2005, she founded the New York Inde- Theatre Studies from York University in Toronto, where he also received his B.A. with honors. His research Graduate Center. Based in part on a three-year issues facing LGBT people. Previously, he worked pendent Schools LGBT Educators Group, provid- focuses around related interests in queer theatre/theory; performance art; nostalgia, memory, and material- research project in partnership with Queers for in fundraising for international nonprofits, in- ing educators professional development and net- ity; the theatrical Avant-Garde; and intersections of U.S. and Canadian performance. Benjamin has presented Economic Justice, Billies’ dissertation, entitled cluding Human Rights Watch, Action Against working opportunities. At the Little Red School for multiple conferences in Canada and the U.S. and has been published in the Canadian Theatre Review, “Let Me See Your ID: Surveillance Threat and the Hunger, and EngenderHealth. He is on the advi- House Founder& Elisabeth Irwin High School (LREI) in & Board of Directors the anthology TRANS(per)FORMING Nina Arsenault: Body of Work/Body of Art from Intellect Press, and has Construction of Human Security and Insecurity,” sory committee for the LGBT Rights Division at New York City, she offers electives on feminism, forthcoming reviews in Theatre Survey and Theatre Journal. critiques everyday policing as a site of struggle Human Rights Watch, the LGBT Rights Commit- LGBT literature, Toni Morrison, and writing mem- JASMINA SINANOVIC FINANCIAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE DIRECTOR over bodies, space, and knowledge, fueled by tee of the Association of the Bar of the City of oir. Ileana is also an associate faculty member accelerating forms of affective control. Concen- New York, and the board of directors of Team New at Bard College’s Institute for Writing and Think-

Jasmina Sinanovic teaches at the Communications Department at the Bronx Community College and Women Coming Up trating on the integration of theory, critical re- York Aquatics. He studied public policy at Brown ing. Founder and sole blogger at Feminist Teach- Studies Department at the City College by day and is a performance/burlesque/theatre artist by night. Her search methods, and liberatory pedagogies, Bil- University; economic and political development er, feministteacher.com, she received her B.A. in research interests are in queer, performance and postcolonial theory as well as the study of the idea of Major Donors List Balkanism. She holds an M.F.A. in Dramaturgy from Stony Brook University and M.A. in Theatre from CUNY. lies writes with and through participatory action at Columbia University’s School of International English Literature at Smith College, and an M.A. research (PAR) approaches; homonationalism; and Public Affairs; and law at the University of in English Literature at Middlebury College. black geographies; transgender studies; trans- California, Hastings College of the Law. SUJAY PANDIT MEMBERSHIPS AND FELLOWSHIPS COORDINATOR Darnell L. Moore is a queer, anti-racist, pro- Sujay Pandit is a Ph.D. candidate in Performance Studies at New York University. His work focuses on the national feminisms; and affect theory. Billies is

Chris A. Eng is a graduate student in the PhD feminist writer and activist who lives in Brooklyn, In Review outgoing Co-Chair of QUNY, the LGBTQ chartered interplay between space/place, architecture, human rights and philosophy. He completed his B.A. in Philos- program in English at The Graduate Center, CUNY. NY. He presently serves as the Director of Educa- student organization of CUNY Graduate Center, ophy and Politics at Sarah Lawrence College and his M.A. in Performance Studies at New York University. He He is interested in questions of knowledge, in- tional Initiatives at the Hetrick-Martin Institute participates as a member of CUNY Graduate Cen- is also keenly interested in digital and new media. Outside of the academy, Sujay has worked as a graphic stitutionality, and the body, working particu- and a Visiting Scholar at the Center for the Study ter’s Public Science Project, and was recently designer, digital archivist/photographer and multimedia specialist for multiple media outlets including: larly with Asian/American cultural productions of Gender and Sexuality at NYU. He is also a Fel- Scientific American Magazine, PBS’ Art:21, the NYU Afghan Digital Library, and various corporations. awarded a dissertation fellowship by IRADAC, The through theorizations of queer discourses and low at the Global Justice Institute. He was ap- Institute for Research on the African Diaspora in critical ethnic studies. pointed as the inaugural chair of the City of New- KALLE WESTERLING MEDIA AND DESIGN INTERN the Americas and the Caribbean. A Brooklyn resi- ark’s Advisory Commission on LGBTQ Concerns by Kalle Westerling is a Ph.D. student in Theatre at CUNY Graduate Center, and in Performance Stud- dent for 18 years, Billies maintains a private Ge- Ileana Jiménez has, for the past fifteen years, Mayor Cory A. Booker and is the co-coordinator, ies at Stockholm University, where he also got his M.A. in Performance Studies. Currently, he is stalt psychotherapy practice, loves African dance been a leader in the field of social justice educa- along with Beryl Satter, of the Queer Newark Oral 001 working on two primary projects, one being his Swedish dissertation about aesthetic and affective class and birding, and lives in a fantastic house tion. A 2011 recipient of the Distinguished Ful- History Project. His primary research interests resistance against heteronormative power and norm structures in contemporary drag show. The called Queer Study Hall. bright Award in Teaching, her research in Mexico

other is an investigation of the New York City burlesque scene in the 1920s and 1930s. & Recognitions Introductions

CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS

CLAGS EVENTS KESSLER CONVERSATIONS 2012 15 Page The Kessler Conversations celebrated award winner Monique Wittig, New York tion’s pre-eminent lgbt rights organization. She AND OUTREACH 20 years of the Kessler Lectureship and artists Chitra Ganesh, Simone Leigh and has worked at the Ford Foundation and served were spread across the 2011/12 academic curator Dean Daderko discussed making as Executive Director of the Arcus Foundation year. The award was initiated in 1991 by work in today’s art world that embodies from 2005 to 2010. She is the author of Virtual 2012 Dr. Martin Duberman, CLAGS’s Founding the uncompromising spirit of pioneers like Equality: The Mainstreaming of Gay and Les- Director (who will be receiving the award Wittig. For more information on speakers bian Liberation. Later this year, Magnus Books will publish her new book, Irresistible Revolu-

this fall) and with the financial support and lecture topics, please see CLAGS’s 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS IN REVIEW BY BENJAMIN GILLESPIE tion: Race, Class and the LGBT Imagination. of David Kessler. In place of an award, Spring 2012 Newsletter. Vaid was a Visiting Senior Fellow with the City CLAGS thought it would be valuable to University of New York (CUNY) Graduate Center’s I am very proud of what CLAGS has been to increase these numbers through our Many who attend our events are Graduate have multiple past Kessler Award winners able to offer in terms of events and outreach multiple outreach programs, which include Center students and faculty; however, we SPRING 2012 Department of Sociology during the 2010-2011 speak on emergent LGBTQ issues and the academic year. In April 2009 Out magazine programs over the past year. Despite a dire social networking resources, our newly re- also attract academics from surrounding history of queer studies in their individual Out Of The Ivory Closet: Scholars And Activ- named her one of the 50 most influential people financial situation and limited resources, designed website, and our bi-annual news- universities and members of the LGBTQ fields. This series also brought in emerg- ists On The Frontlines The celebration of in the United States. CLAGS still offered a vibrant calendar of letter, all helped us reach this goal. community. CLAGS welcomes all to our free ing researchers and practitioners to help CLAGS twentieth anniversary continued with the Kessler Conversation between Susan Stryker, Susan Stryker is an Associate Professor of events, continuing to partner with many events and we are committed to maintain an evaluate where we have been and where CLAGS continues to increase communica- Kessler Lecturer in 2008, and Urvashi Vaid, Kes- Gender and Women’s Studies and the Director members of the community creating a chal- open dialogue with the public we serve. we are going in the field of LGBTQ studies. CLAGS Fellowships lenging and diverse platform for intellectual tion with its members and seeks feedback sler Lecturer in 2010. This conversation opened of the Institute for LGBT Studies at the Univer- leadership and conversations surrounding in order to improve our events. Feedback I look forward to another exciting year and In Fall 2011, Kessler speakers included: up a dialogue on the important link between sity of Arizona. She was the Executive Director LGBTQ issues in the medium of colloquia, given for the 2011/12 year was resoundingly hope to see you at all of our events, entering Edmund White in conversation with fic- scholarship and activism with two activists/ of the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco. scholars who have been on the frontline of LGBT Stryker’s most recent book is Transgender His- seminars, conferences, fellowships and positive and many people who attended our into the stimulating discourse taking place tion writer Rakesh Satyal on the changing politics for more than twenty years. tory (Seal Press 2008). She is also the co-editor awards ceremonies, and lecture series. The events have now become CLAGS members. I in LGBTQ studies at CLAGS. face of queer fiction; American cultural encourage anyone reading this letter to con- of The Transgender Studies Reader (Routledge success of these events showcases CLAGS’s anthropologists Esther Newton, Gayle Ru- Urvashi Vaid is the Director of the Engaging 2006), which has won a Lambda Book Award. continued impact within academic, artistic, tact me with any feedback you might have, bin, and Carole Vance discussed the value Tradition Project at the Center for Gender and CLAGS Events and Outreach 2012 or proposals for events. If you are interested She won an Emmy Award for the documentary and LGBTQ communities alike. of ethnographic methodologies within the Sexuality Law at Columbia Law School. She was film Screaming Queens: The Riot at Compton’s in proposing an event, you can visit our web- study of sexual subcultures in the U.S.; the Executive Director of the National Gay and Cafeteria (Frameline/ITVS 2005). In the past year, I am happy to report that site, where information on this process is and lastly, in memory of late Kessler Lesbian Taskforce from 1989-1992 and again attendance rates at our events have doubled listed, or email to [email protected]. from 1997-2000, and built it to become the na- from previous years, and our ongoing goal Coming Up Rainbow Book Fair SPECIAL EVENTS IN SPRING 2012 In Review The Homonationalism and Pinkwashing conference will examine global queer resistance and complicity For more information on these events, Poetry—the world’s only print journal dedi- Endowed Lecture: Scenes from a Jamai- in international relations. Activists and scholars will or to access recordings, please contact: cated to the gay poet. Poets read together, can Childhood Thomas Glave (SUNY Visiting Scholars convene and bring together theoretical and applied [email protected]. legend alongside rising star; established Binghamton) gave the 2011 Audre Lorde/ perspectives, focusing on queer future, movements, artist next to emerging artist. The event Essex Hemphill Memorial Lecture. This Rainbow Book Fair Kickoff – Assaracus: showcased the collective voices of some of lecture is meant to commemorate the lives JASBIR PUAR JUDITH BUTLER RABIH ALAMEDDINE HANEEN MAIKEY and efforts. A Celebration of Gay Poetry To kick off gay poetry’s brightest contemporary writers of the American poets Audre Lorde (1934 the Rainbow Book Fair, CLAGS and Sibling in one place, at one time, and featured the -1992) and Essex Hemphill (1957 -1995), as Homonationalism and CUNY Graduate Center, New York Rivalry Press presented poets from the first launch of Assaracus: Issue 06. well as encourage exciting scholarship and six issues of Assaracus: A Journal of Gay Pinkwashing April 10–13, 2013 & Recognitions Introductions Lambda Literary Awards

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Benjamin Gillespie (BG) You were recently awarded an honorary doctoral degree from Amherst College for your prolific and groundbreaking career, as It wasn’t that we wanted to become POSITIONING THE RADICAL well as your passion for honoring the pasts of those that live in the “margins of our society.” In your keynote address, you critiqued the assimilationist focus accepted members of established of the national gay rights agenda, which features marriage and the military as institutions; it was rather that we AN INTERVIEW WITH its central components, and—paraphrasing your words—ignores the needs of the lower economic factions of queer society within the American corporate wanted to change the institutions. MARTIN DUBERMAN capitalist system. Seeing as Amherst is a liberal institution, how was this critique received? Rather than being allowed to join KESSLER AWARD Martin Duberman (MD) I had wondered whether or not there would be the military, we wanted to challenge some hostility, but anyone who said anything—at least subsequent to the speech—was positive about it and agreed with me. One young guy said, “it’s the whole idea of war and state- COMING UP RECIPIENT 2012 amazing that someone as old as you are would have radical ideas!” BG Radical ideas are something you have had for a long time. Perhaps the sanctioned killing. The whole war audience at Amherst appreciated your critique more than some gays, who are machine was our target and we pushing instead for assimilation and integration. MD Sure. It was, of course, a self-selected audience. And Amherst is weren’t eager to put on the uniform. Benjamin Gillespie (CLAGS Events and Outreach Coordinator, liberal—even more than it used to be. Its outgoing president, Anthony Marx, has recently been named head of the library system in New York. In the past, he war and state-sanctioned killing. The whole war machine was our target and made sure that a number of Africans received scholarships to Amherst College. PhD. student in theatre) interviews Professor Martin Duberman we weren’t eager to put on the uniform. It was interesting how many of the students that were there were minorities. It Positioning the Radical: Interview with Martin Duberman wasn’t that long ago that it was completely white and male. The same is true of marriage. As gay people, we learned a great deal about about his life as a historian, playwright, scholar, and activist; relationships that perhaps mainstream America didn’t know or wasn’t willing BG That is another part of your critique, isn’t it? That the assimilationist to acknowledge, in terms of the roles people play in a partnered relationship. his recent honorary degree from Amherst College; and being agenda is generally geared toward the upper-middle-class white male? The studies that have been done make it very clear that gay relationships MD Certainly. But that’s hardly surprising. It has always been that way. (and I mean gay inclusively—lesbian, trans, queer, etc.) tend to be much awarded the 2012 Kessler Award. BG And this was the first time Amherst awarded an honorary doctorate more egalitarian than heterosexual ones. Also, there is the whole issue of to a “marginalized person,” correct? In the description I quoted earlier, it is monogamous marriage. I think that there is a wide spectrum of different kinds Events Calendar Fall 2012 interesting how they never mention gay or queer, but use the language of of gay relationships: some are monogamous; some are “open”; some are “marginalizaton.” Do you have any thoughts on this? sexual for a time, but then become companionable. MD I think that it is all code for gay. Well, not all gay. Back in 1963, I wrote Radicals still don’t accept that institutions currently structured are in any a play called “In White America” about being black in white America, which sense universal or maximally indicate human needs. In our point of view, we continues to be performed. When they say, “live on the margins,” I think the don’t want to join up. Yes, we want all the rights everybody else has. But at reference is also to race, not just sexual orientation. the same time, we want the right to challenge traditional institutions. The original GLF differed much from today’s politics. We don’t want merely to be Born This Way: Q&A with Paul Vitagliano BG I think another word they could have used was ‘radical.’ You often good patriotic citizens because there is a lot wrong with national values and distinguish between liberal and radical political positions, identifying yourself national policies and we want to challenge those. as a radical because you are someone who has struggled and continues to fight to substantially restructure the system itself, rather than push for BG Let’s move to something more personal. To quote you in Cures: A Gay LGBT integration into the system as it currently exists. Can you say anything Man’s Odyssey, you state, “It was easier for me to harangue the country about more about this distinction and how it has influenced your career as a gay changing its ways than to change my own; perhaps because—a notion I can historian? only entertain in retrospect—the country really did need to remake itself, A Queer Library Collection MD It does seem to me that being allowed “in” to whereas I did not.” Here, you were referring to having an optimistic viewpoint mainstream culture is not the goal that the Gay when it came to the country’s politics, but a more negative opinion of your own Liberation Front (GLF) originally aimed at. It wasn’t struggle with a gay identity that you hadn’t yet accepted. that we wanted to become accepted members of Looking at this experience retrospectively here, you point out your own guilty established institutions; it was rather that we conscience, which essentially pushed you to want to conform (at that time) wanted to change the institutions. Rather to mainstream heterosexual value systems and beliefs. Thinking about your than being allowed to join the military, we talk at Amherst, this still seems to me to be a prevalent problem—that is, gay Seminar in the City Fall 2012: Queering the Frame wanted to challenge the whole idea of assimilationism and the guilty conscience of queer radicalism. Performing Que(e)ries 022

QUEER VOICES, CARIBBEAN IRN RECEIVES GRANT QUEER WORLDS 35 Page UPDATE FROM THE TO CREATE SEXUALITIES COURSE INTERNATIONAL RESOURCE BY ROSAMOND S. KING NETWORK CO-CHAIR OF THE CARIBBEAN IRN REGIONAL BOARD REPORTS FROM THE BY RÜSTEM ERTUG ALTINAY CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS

The first six months of 2012 was a particularly active and fruitful pe- Asia also sponsored one day of Chinese Lala Alliance’s bi-annual international The Caribbean Region of the International Resource Network (IRN) is ing the course material over the next several years, and because the final riod for the International Resource Network (IRN), a global network of conference, where speakers and workshop trainers from India, the Philippines, pleased to announce the receipt of a $20,000 grant from the International course materials will be available on the internet, this project will also researchers, activists, artists, and teachers sharing knowledge about Taiwan, and Hong Kong discussed about the connection between queer and Association for the Study of Sexuality, Culture, and Society (IASSCS) to strengthen the growing field of Caribbean sexuality studies both in the diverse sexualities, hosted by the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies. feminist theory and sexuality activism. In order to encourage young scholars create and present an Advanced Sexuality Studies Short Course. The region and around the world. Our organization continued to grow with new projects and alliances, and students interested in sexuality studies in the region, IRN Asia is now course will be presented during the summer of 2013 in Trinidad through The Caribbean region of the IRN was created in 2008 and connects serving the needs of scholars, activists, artists and students world- organizing a competition to support the work of students with the best project a collaboration with the Institute for Gender and Development Studies academic and community-based researchers, artists, and activists around (IGDS) at the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine (Trinidad & wide. proposals in the field. Another major project of IRN Africa was the digital sto- the Caribbean and in the diaspora in areas related to diverse sexualities Tobago) campus. and genders. The Caribbean IRN highlights and promotes activism and The Africa region of IRN launched two new projects, the Digital Library of rytelling workshops implemented in China. The workshops teach participants The Advanced Sexuality Studies Short Course (ASSC) consists of a variety creative work, as well as different kinds of engaged scholarship which Africa and Voices in the Shadows. The Digital Library of Africa is a web project how to make short videos on their personal stories, capturing their oral history of course modules on various sexuality topics freely available through seek to question, provoke and illuminate various ways of thinking about connected to the IRN website. The project will feature material documenting through image and sounds, with the ultimate goal of sharing the videos with a wider audience. The project also involves developing a training manual for the open source technology at www.sexualitystudies.net. IASSCS developed same-sex desire and sexual minorities. Africa’s queer history. Voices in the Shadows is a radio drama series dealing the ASSC with funding from the Ford Foundation in response to a growing INTERNATIONAL RESOURCE NETWORK The IRN is an internet-based project created by the Center for Lesbian with issues facing gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) com- workshops to be made available to other groups. recognition of the need for graduate-level training in critical sexuality and Gay Studies (CLAGS) at the City University of New York in 2002. The munities in Kenya, developed primarily by and for LGBTI Kenyans who still face In the meantime, the Caribbean, Latin America, and the Middle East regions studies in the global South; the project was piloted in sites including purpose of the IRN is to link researchers, activists, artists, and teachers institutionalized and social discrimination. IRN Africa has also co-sponsored of the IRN continued to develop their projects. IRN Caribbean launched the South Africa and Vietnam. The Caribbean IRN’s course will not only com- from both academic and community bases in areas related to diverse the International Day against Homophobia (IDAHO) events organized by the Gay publication Theorizing Homophobia in the Caribbean, an edited collection bring- bine the considerable expertise of faculty from the IRN board and UWI’s sexualities. It strives to be a central internet location (at www.irnweb.org) and Lesbian Coalition of Kenya, and the queer e-magazine Identity Kenya. IRN ing together works which reflect on the complexities of homophobia(s) in the IGDS, it will also utilize webconferencing technology and web-based for people interested in approaching sexual rights and human rights from Africa has also prepared a new issue of Outliers, an e-journal featuring essays Caribbean to expand awareness about Caribbean LGBT lives, experiences, and materials (including the IRN’s Theorizing Homophobias in the Caribbean the perspective of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer studies, written by scholars and activists whose work is focused on African sexualities. activism in the region and its diaspora. The collection is available online. IRN collection and our online archive at http://www.dloc.com/icirn). This or who are interested in surveying research on particular sexual minority All issues of Outliers are available on the IRN website. Caribbean also expanded the Digital Archives of the Activist and Related Work collaboration will encourage Caribbean students’ study of and research issues around the globe. Over many years, the IRN has received generous on sexuality and will facilitate connections among faculty in this field at

in the Caribbean project. There are three established collections in this digital support from the Ford Foundation to build this project. Coming Up Determined to contribute to the emergence of new queer voices in the region, UWI and in the USA. Because the teaching faculty will commit to teach- IRN Asia developed a variety of new projects. “In Search of Queer” is an online archive: a general one presenting a variety of relevant material from the region, digital library that will compile and introduce selected queer studies and sexu- the collection of the Gay Freedom Movement of Jamaica, and the collection of ality studies texts to China, especially those from the rest of Asia. The website the Rainbow Alliance of the Bahamas. IRN Latin America developed two new The Caribbean Region of the IRN will include translated articles, resources, book reviews, original articles, issues of Sexualidades, an e-journal featuring essays in the field of sexuality special opinion columns written by sexuality studies scholars, and interactive studies in the Americas. IRN Middle East continued to expand Turkey’s Queer The Caribbean Region of the IRN is a resource for people and organizations whose work focuses on issues projects where community members can submit photos and short posts. The Lives: An Oral History Project. Implemented in collaboration with Bogazici related to diverse genders and sexualities in the Caribbean. The Caribbean IRN serves as a network among In Review project aims to promote the articulation of a native discourse by Chinese LGBT University’s Department of History, Turkey’s Queer Lives collects oral history activists, scholars, community organizers, writers, artists, and community-based researchers, among others, accounts from LGBTQ people to be published as an edited volume. IRN Middle activists. “On the Margins” reading group focuses on the marginalized people inside and outside the Caribbean. and issues within the sexual minority communities in Asia. The group reads East’s Transnational Peer Review Network (TPRN) continued to serve the needs Resources and projects include: both classic works of queer theory and newer, creative works, mainly from the of students and researchers. TPRN is a free online network designed to provide region. IRN Asia also co-sponsored one of the first lesbian non-fiction books pro bono peer reviewing services for students, scholars and independent — The Caribbean IRN Digital Archive on the Digital Library of the Caribbean: dloc.com/icirn published in China, where implicit rules prevent such books from official researchers working in the field of Middle Eastern sexualities. The service is — Special Archive collections, including the Digital Archive of the Gay Freedom Movement of Jamaica: dloc.com/icirngfm publication. The Lace Dictionary unearths the history of same-sex love between available in English, Arabic, Persian and Turkish. For more information, please — Multimedia Collection, Theorizing Homophobias in the Caribbean: caribbeanhomophobias.org women in China and re-tells their forgotten stories. Another publication by IRN contact R. Ertug Altinay: [email protected]. — Online Networking and Resources through the IRN website, the Caribbean IRN listserv, and the Caribbean IRN Facebook Page. Asia is the China queer women’s activism map. This project features a map of To participate in our projects, to learn the latest news and opportunities in the queer women’s activism in China, including background and contact informa- field of sexuality studies, and to communicate with other individuals and groups For more information, visit irnweb.org, email [email protected], tion for each organization. The map will be available in print and online. IRN that are active in the field, please visit our website: www.irnweb.org. or join the Facebook Group Caribbean IRN & Recognitions Introductions 034

CLAGS NEWS is published twice a year by the Center for Lesbian and STAFF

Executive Director James Wilson Global Coordinator for IRN Gay Studies at the CUNY Graduate Center. All submissions related to Rüstem Ertug Altınay Events and Outreach Coordinator Benjamin Gillespie the study of gay, lesbian, transgender, and bisexual experiences are Financial and Administrative Director Jasmina Sinanovic Memberships and Fellowships Coordinator welcome. Please address all inquires to CLAGSnews, The Graduate Sujay Pandit Media and Design Intern Kalle Westerling Center, The City of New York, Room 7115, New York, NY 10016 Phone: Newsletter Editor Benjamin Gillespie Newsletter Design 212.817.1955 or email: [email protected]. Kalle Westerling

CLAGS STAFF

JAMES WILSON EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR James Wilson is Professor of English and Theatre at LaGuardia Community College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. Areas of research include queer theatre and performance, African American theatre, and pedagogy. His articles have ap- peared in Urban Education, Teaching English in the Two-Year College, and Theatre History Studies. His essay, “’Ladies and Gentlemen, People Die’: The Uncomfortable Performances of Kiki and Herb,” appeared in an anthology of lesbian and gay theatre and perfor- mances in Fall 2008. He is co-editor of The Journal of American Drama and Theatre, which is published by the Martin E. Theatre Segal Center (CUNY Graduate Center). His book, Bulldaggers, Pansies, and Chocolate Babies: Race, Performance, and Sexuality in the Harlem Renaissance, was published by University of Michigan Press in 2010, and a paperback version was made available in 2011. RUSTEM ERTUG ALTINAY GLOBAL COORDINATOR FOR IRN Rüstem Ertug Altınay is the general coordinator and the Middle East regional coordinator of the International Resource Network (IRN). Under the IRN, he isalso coordinating the Turkey’s Queer Lives oral history project and the Transnational Peer Review Network for research on Middle Eastern sexualities. Ertug is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Performance Studies at New York Uni- versity. His main area of research is gender, sexuality and body politics in Turkey. His work appeared in academic journals including Women’s Studies Quarterly, Feminist Media Studies, the International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics, and the Journal of Women’s History as well as various edited volumes. Ertug is also the project manager of the Istanbul-based theater company, Theater Painted Bird. BENJAMIN GILLESPIE EVENTS AND OUTREACH COORDINATOR Benjamin Gillespie is a Ph.D. student in Theatre at the CUNY Graduate Center. Benjamin holds an M.A. in Theatre Studies from York University in Toronto, where he also received his B.A. with honors. His research focuses around related interests in queer theatre/ theory; performance art; nostalgia, memory, and materiality; the theatrical Avant-Garde; and intersections of U.S. and Canadian performance. Benjamin has presented for multiple conferences in Canada and the U.S. and has been published in the Canadian The- atre Review, the anthology TRANS(per)FORMING Nina Arsenault: Body of Work/Body of Art from Intellect Press, and has forthcoming review in Theatre Survey. JASMINA SINANOVIC FINANCIAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE DIRECTOR Jasmina Sinanovic teaches at the Communications Department at the Bronx Community College and Women Studies Department at the City College by day and is a performance/burlesque/theatre artist by night. Her research interests are in queer, performance and postcolonial theory as well as the study of the idea of Balkanism. She holds an M.F.A. in Dramaturgy from Stony Brook University and M.A. in Theatre from CUNY.

SUJAY PANDIT MEMBERSHIPS AND FELLOWSHIPS COORDINATOR Sujay Pandit is a Ph.D. candidate in Performance Studies at New York University. His work focuses on the interplay between space/ place, architecture, human rights and philosophy. He completed his B.A. in Philosophy and Politics at Sarah Lawrence College and his M.A. in Performance Studies at New York University. He is also keenly interested in digital and new media. Outside of the acad- emy, Sujay has worked as a graphic designer, digital archivist/photographer and multimedia specialist for multiple media outlets including: Scientific American Magazine, PBS’ Art:21, the NYU Afghan Digital Library, and various corporations. KALLE WESTERLING MEDIA AND DESIGN INTERN Kalle Westerling is a Ph.D. student in Theatre at CUNY Graduate Center, and in Performance Studies at Stockholm University, where he also got his M.A. in Performance Studies. Currently, he is working on two primary projects, one being his Swedish dissertation about aesthetic and affective resistance against heteronormative power and norm structures in contemporary drag show. The other is an investigation of the New York City burlesque scene in the 1920s and 1930s.

ALLI LINDNER DEVELOPMENT, MEMBERSHIPS, AND FELLOWSHIPS INTERN Alli Lindner has been the Development, Memberships, and Fellowships intern at CLAGS since January of 2012. She is currently a senior at Hunter College majoring in Women and Gender Studies. She will graduate with her bachelor’s degree in May of 2013. She is also a senior fellow in the Young People For program and a key organizer of QRASH Course: Queers Resisting All Street Harass- ment. CLAGS BOARD MEMBERS 5 Page

CLAGS FOUNDER Martin Duberman, Distinguished Professor of History Emeritus, Lehman College and The Graduate Center (CUNY)

CLAGS BOARD OF DIRECTORS Chair: Jennifer Gaboury, Political Science Thomas Glave, English, SUNY Binghamton Christopher Adam Mitchell, History and Women’s and Gender Studies, Hunter (On Leave) Department, Rutgers University-New Bruns- CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS College, CUNY James Green, History Department, Brown wick Jason Baumann, Coordinator of Collection University Alyssa Nitchun, Creative Time Assessment and LGBT Collections, New York Daniel Hurewitz, History Department, Angelique V. Nixon, Women’s Studies, Public Library Hunter College, CUNY University of Connecticut Matt Brim, English Department, College of Beck Jordan-Young, Women’s Studies Dagmawi Woubshet, English, Cornell Staten Island, CUNY Department, Barnard College University Jeffrey Escoffier, Independent Scholar Neil Meyer, English Department, La Guardia Community College, CUNY

INCOMING CLAGS BOARD MEMBERS

Michelle Billies is a Ph.D. candidate in the Randall Chamberlain is an immigration lawyer bright Award in Teaching, her research in Mexico Social-Personality Psychology program of CUNY in private practice, with a focus on immigration City focused on creating safe schools for LGBT Graduate Center. Based in part on a three-year re- issues facing LGBT people. Previously, he worked youth. In 2005, she founded the New York Inde- search project in partnership with Queers for Eco- in fundraising for international nonprofits, includ- pendent Schools LGBT Educators Group, providing nomic Justice, Billies’ dissertation, entitled “Let ing Human Rights Watch, Action Against Hunger, educators professional development and network- Me See Your ID: Surveillance Threat and the Con- and EngenderHealth. He is on the advisory com- ing opportunities. At the Little Red School House struction of Human Security and Insecurity,” cri- mittee for the LGBT Rights Division at Human & Elisabeth Irwin High School (LREI) in New York tiques everyday policing as a site of struggle over Rights Watch, the LGBT Rights Committee of the City, she offers electives on feminism, LGBT litera-

bodies, space, and knowledge, fueled by acceler- Association of the Bar of the City of New York, and ture, Toni Morrison, and writing memoir. Ileana is Coming Up ating forms of affective control. Concentrating on the board of directors of Team New York Aquatics. also an associate faculty member at Bard College’s the integration of theory, critical research meth- He studied public policy at Brown University; eco- Institute for Writing and Thinking. Founder and ods, and liberatory pedagogies, Billies writes with nomic and political development at Columbia Uni- sole blogger at Feminist Teacher, feministteacher. and through participatory action research (PAR) versity’s School of International and Public Affairs; com, she received her B.A. in English Literature at approaches; homonationalism; black geographies; and law at the University of California, Hastings Smith College, and an M.A. in English Literature at

transgender studies; transnational feminisms; and College of the Law. Middlebury College. In Review affect theory. Billies is outgoing Co-Chair of QUNY, Chris A. Eng is a graduate student in the PhD Darnell L. Moore is a queer, anti-racist, pro- the LGBTQ chartered student organization of CUNY program in English at The Graduate Center, CUNY. feminist writer and activist who lives in Brooklyn, Graduate Center, participates as a member of CUNY He is interested in questions of knowledge, in- NY. He presently serves as the Director of Educa- Graduate Center’s Public Science Project, and was stitutionality, and the body, working particularly tional Initiatives at the Hetrick-Martin Institute recently awarded a dissertation fellowship by with Asian/American cultural productions through and a Visiting Scholar at the Center for the Study IRADAC, The Institute for Research on the African theorizations of queer discourses and critical eth- of Gender and Sexuality at NYU. He is also a Fellow Diaspora in the Americas and the Caribbean. A nic studies. at the Global Justice Institute. He was appointed Brooklyn resident for 18 years, Billies maintains as the inaugural chair of the City of Newark’s Ad- a private Gestalt psychotherapy practice, loves Ileana Jiménez has, for the past fifteen years, visory Commission on LGBTQ Concerns by Mayor African dance class and birding, and lives in a fan- been a leader in the field of social justice educa- Cory A. Booker and is the co-coordinator, along tastic house called Queer Study Hall. tion. A 2011 recipient of the Distinguished Ful- & Recognitions Introductions

INCOMING CLAGS BOARD MEMBERS (CONT’D)

with Beryl Satter, of the Queer Newark Oral History matic Theory and Criticism, TDR: The Drama Re- professional development of students. Clinically, Project. His primary research interests include con- view, Theatre Journal, Theatre Survey, and Modern he practices emergency medicine at Montefiore structions and performances of sexual identity and Drama, where he guest-edited a special issue on Medical Center, Bronx, NY. gender expressions within African-American reli- “Gossip” and where he is the book review editor. His Andrew Spieldenner earned his Ph.D. in Com- gious spaces. His essays, poetry, op-eds and inter- essay, “Uncloseting Drama: Gertrude Stein and the munication & Culture from Howard University with views examining theses issues have been published Wooster Group,” which won Modern Drama’s award an emphasis on health. Dr. Spieldenner has held in peer-reviewed and professional periodicals like for Outstanding Essay of 2007, was recently reprint- positions at the NYC Department of Health, Black Trans-scripts: An Interdisciplinary Online Journal in ed in Reading Modern Drama (University of Toronto AIDS Institute, the Latino Commission on AIDS and the Humanities, Theology & Sexuality, Black Theol- Press, 2012). His current book project, “Obstruc- the National Association of People with AIDS. He is ogy: An International Journal, Pneuma: Journal for tion,” investigates the value to intellectual work of currently Assistant Professor in the Department of the Society of Pentecostal Studies, Transforming putatively impedimental experiential phenomena Speech Communication, Rhetoric and Performance Anthropology, Mary: A Literary Quarterly, Lambda like embarrassment, laziness, cynicism, slowness, Studies at Hofstra University. Dr. Spieldenner is Literary, TheBody.com, and Arts & Understanding. and exhaustion. openly living with HIV and a long-time commu- He also is a contributing writer on Huffington Post, John-Paul Sanchez, MD, MPH has focused his nity advocate with twenty years serving high-risk PrettyQueer.com, Mondoweiss, and UrbanCusp, and research on the health needs of the LGBT com- populations including racial/ethnic minorities, gay he is an Editorial Collective Member of The Feminist munity in the areas of medical education, sexually men and people living with HIV/AIDS. His research Wire. transmitted diseases, and smoking cessation. He focuses on HIV stigma and disclosure, intercultural Nick Salvato is Assistant Professor of Theatre and is a founding Board Member of the Bronx Lesbian communication, health communication, cultural a member of the graduate faculty of English at Cor- and Gay Health Resource Consortium (currently studies and sexuality. nell University. His first book, Uncloseting Drama: the Bronx Community Pride Center). He currently American Modernism and Queer Performance (Yale serves as the Chairperson of the Einstein LGBT University Press, 2010), is part of the series Yale Steering Committee of the Albert Einstein College Studies in English. His articles have appeared in of Medicine and is charged with building a support- such journals as Camera Obscura, Journal of Dra- ive institutional climate to support the personal and

The Caribbean Region of the International Resource Network Proudly Introduces: Theorizing Homophobias in the Caribbean: Complexities of Place, Desire and Belonging An online multi-media collection including activist reports, creative writing, critical essays, film, interviews, music, and performance and visual arts; a project reflecting on the complexities of homophobias in the Caribbean, while also expanding understanding of Caribbean sexual minority experiences and activism in the region and its diaspora. Towards greater understanding and deeper reflections of Caribbean Sexualities, this collection features engaging scholarly work and highlights of exciting activism across the region, alongside dynamic artistic expressions.

Edited by the Caribbean Regional Board Co-Chairs Rosamond S. King and Angelique V. Nixon Board Members: Natalie Bennett and Colin Robinson, along with co-ordination consultant Vidyaratha Kissoon

Visit www.caribbeanhomophobias.org for the virtual launch MAJOR DONORS 7 Page

The following generous Dean’s List — $250–499 Perry Brass Marilyn Neimark & Alisa Solomon CLAGS members have Boaz Adler Matt Brim Richard Picardi donated $100.00 or more to David Allyn Michael Bronski Thomas Rini our organization between Dennis Barnes Diane Bruessow Richard Robertson July 1st 2011 and June 30th Judith Butler Howard Carlin Marc Rogers 2012. Carol Chinn Lee Ross Chambers Bruce Rosen Ahuva Cohen Dianne Rubenstein

David Eng 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS Presidential Circle — Over Margaret Cruikshank Alan Sabal $500 Milt Ford Jennifer Gaboury Paisley Currah Sarah Schulman Anonymous Larry Gross Dennis Debiak Larry Schulte Diane Bernard & Joan Heller Arnold Grossman Muriel Dimen Mark Schulte Glenn Burger & Steven Kruger Eric Hartman Ann Fitzgerald Laurence Philip Senelick Sarah Chinn James Holmes Chris R. Ford James Shields Jill Dolan & Stacy Wolf David Jones Adam Geary Michael Sonberg Jack Drescher Regina Kunzel Steven H. Haeberle Arthur Spears Martin Duberman & Eli Zal Arthur Leonard David Jones Marc Stein Lisa Duggan C. Richard Matthews Louis Kampf Joseph Strauss Jeffrey Escoffier Robert McCullough Jr. Arnold Kantrowitz Dara Strolovitch Katherine Franke Weston Milliken Charles Kloth Carl Sylvestre James Green Fred Moten Lawrence LaFountain-Stokes Polly Thistlethwaite Daniel Hurewitz Rosemary Palladino Paul Lauter John Treat Bec Jordan-Young Nancy Rabinowitz Ronnie Lesser Randolph Trumbach David R. Kessler David Serlin William D. Lubart Charles Upchurch Loring McAlpin Thomas Spear Wahneema Lubiano Carmen Vazquez Judith Milhous Susan Stryker Harry Lutrin Edward Weber Christopher Adam Mitchell Carole S. Vance Hermes Malea & Carey Maloney Amanda Wilson Jonathan Ned Katz James Wilson Harriet Malinowitz Evan Wilson Pam Parker Dagmawi Woubshet Douglas Mao Kevin Brooks Winkler Colin Smith Joanne Meyerowitz Hugh Young Coming Up Honor Roll — $100–249 Urvashi Vaid Bob Meyers Institutional Support and Karen Miller Martha Vicinus Anthony Allacino Foundations Michael J. Miller Joseph Wittreich Jr. & Stuart Kelly Anderson Jennifer Mitchell Robert Giard Foundation Curran Mark Blasius & Rico Barbosa Virginia Mollenkott Ford Foundation

Terry Boggis In Review Amy Moran CUNY Graduate Center

EMERGENCY ASK FUNDRAISER ERRATA In December of last year, CLAGS initiated the Emergency Ask Fundraiser to provide financial support at a time In our last newsletter, we incor- when the organization was facing harsh budget cuts. We are pleased to report that our Emergency Ask raised rectly identified Mark Blasius and more than $25,000. It was truly heartwarming and reassuring to hear from so many of our members, new and regretfully omitted Bec Jordan- old, and to receive their financial help at time when CLAGS needs it most. Thanks to the generosity of those Young. who support CLAGS, we can continue to provide all the resources, tools and fellowship support that makes CLAGS an invaluable part of the LGBT community. If you did not get a chance to donate to the Emergency Ask, please consider making a donation, in any amount, on our website www.clags.org. We thank you! & Recognitions Introductions

This page is an ad. This page is an ad. CALL FOR PAPERS: WERK IT—GAY FOR PLAY The LGBTQ Focus Group of the Association for Theatre — What potential do playful dramaturgies of protest— in Higher Education (ATHE) invites panel, performance, from Brecht to Boal to Butler; from deep play to dark play roundtable, seminar, “text-and-response,” working group, to camp play—continue to hold amidst the changing de- and related proposals for ATHE 2013 in Orlando, FL. Al- mands placed upon queer activism, locally and globally, by though presentations on all topics related to theatre and neoliberalism and the decline of liberal democracy? performance in general and to LGBTQ issues in particular — What forms of gender play and playful sexual expres- will be considered, we encourage participants to develop sion have yet to be discovered in the representations and ideas related to the conference theme, “P[L]AY: Perfor- narratives of the dramatic canon, not only in authors more mance, Pleasure, and Pedagogy.” friendly to queer readings (Shakespeare, Stein) but also in Provocatively leaping the gap between pleasure and labor, those more seemingly resistant (Goethe, Chekhov)? play and political economy, the conference theme “P[L]AY” We also invite session coordinators to think “queerly” invites a wide range of interventions from queer theorists, about the kinds of sessions that they propose and the dis- critics, performers, and performing theorists with (a criti- ciplinary diversity of the colleagues in those proposed ses- cal) attitude. The LGBTQ Focus Group is therefore inter- sions (though a certain number of traditional panel pro- ested in sessions exploring the ways in which work and posals are, of course, welcome). How, for instance, might leisure collide and collude in queer experience, aesthetics, we profit from a series of participants’ short assessments and activism. We hope our sessions will attend to the the- of a single, guiding performance or text? What kind of atrical, historical, geographical, and cultural dimensions conversation would emerge in a seminar whose members of the specific roles that queer persons occupy in play-as- (scholars, artists, and others) circulated pre-written pa- work and work-as-play economies. Questions to be consid- pers to generate discussion questions for the conference? ered may include: How might a session take advantage of the conference’s — How do queerness and labor intersect in local and glob- local tourist attractions to craft site-specific performance al economies of pleasure? Specific sites of investigation interventions? What more radical alternatives to the tra- might include sex work; drag performers as tourist attrac- ditional panel have yet to be conceived? tions; worker efficiency as werk; unique expectations upon For more information, contact conference organizer Jason queers in service industries (food service, tourism, beauty Fitzgerald ([email protected]). Consultation with the care, interior design, etc.); the marketization of coming- LGBTQ conference planner well in advance of the Novem- out narratives in solo drama, reality television, and tab- ber 1 deadline is recommended and appreciated. Complete loid journalism. sessions are strongly encouraged, but individual paper pro- — In what ways do theatre and entertainment for young posals may also be submitted. people, particularly (but not only) from Disney and its In order to be considered, individual proposals must be subsidiaries, deliver “scriptive things” that shape the con- submitted by October 1, 2012. Abstracts (250 words) must sciousness of queer youth? include the presentation title and the submitter’s contact — How does play become an imperative for art students, information and must specify any A/V needs. Individuals whether in conservatories or liberal arts colleges, and wishing to identify colleagues with whom to create ses- what effects does this imperative have upon queer youth sions prior to the November 1 deadline may use the LGBTQ and queers aspiring to be artists? By extension, how does listserv to circulate questions or possible session topics (LG- the institutionalization of play as pedagogy create its own [email protected]). ATHE does not accept individual paper challenges for students learning to play in the real world? submissions: do not submit your individual proposal on the ATHE website. — How is queerness managed in professional sports, whether in recruiting practices, journalistic coverage, or Session coordinators with proposals that encompass the team dynamics? What sorts of queer interventions are at interests of multiple focus groups to pursue a multidisci- play when sports are placed on stage or otherwise made to plinary session are especially encouraged. feel theatrical?

LGBTQ FOCUS GROUP | ASSOCIATION FOR THEATRE IN HIGHER EDUCATION (ATHE) CONFERENCE AUGUST 1-4, 2013, HYATT REGENCY (GRAND CYPRESS), ORLANDO, FL This page is an ad. This page is an ad.

SEPTEMBER 27–30, 2012 NEW YORK CITY

CUNY Graduate Center NYU Kimmel Center The LGBT Center 365 Fifth Avenue 60 Washington Square South 208 West 13th Street radicallyCLAGS & The Harry Hay Centennial Committee present GAY The Life & Visionary Legacy of Harry Hay

Conference Keynotes: In honor of the one hundredth anni- An actor, Communist labor orga- Bettina Aptheker versary of Harry Hay’s birth, this four nizer, musicologist, gay theoretician Cheryl Clarke day conference and evening of per- and political activist, Harry Hay left John D’Emilio formance will examine Hay’s life and a lasting mark that continues well Will Roscoe ideas and explore the multiple facets into the 21st century. He was active of LGBT life that Hay pioneered. in the Los Angeles avant-garde arts Performance hosted by the New York Through film, panels, papers, oral his- movement of the 1930s; participated (dis)Order of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence tories and experiential workshops, the in the San Francisco General Strike of conference will focus on the themes of 1934; fought against Fascism, racism For more information, to register or pur- LGBT arts, political activism, spiri- and Anti-Semitism in the 1940s. In chase tickets, go to: tuality and sexual identities as they 1948, he conceived of and created the http://tinyurl.com/Harry-Hay developed over the span of Hay’s life first sustained, gay activist group in and as they evolve into the future. America, the Mattachine Society. In the 1970s, he was central to the found- social & analysiscultural ing of the Radical Faeries. CLAGS FELLOWSHIPS

BY SUJAY PANDIT

This past year, CLAGS offered five fellowships: The Martin film or video of no more than 30 minutes in length. This Duberman Fellowship, The Robert Giard Fellowship and the award will support a directed project, one that is new or Joan Heller–Diane Bernard Fellowship in Lesbian and Gay continuing, that addresses issues of sexuality, gender, or Studies, the CLAGS Fellowship Award and the Paul Monette- LGBTQ identity. Roger Horwitz Dissertation Prize. We were impressed by the The Joan Heller–Diane Bernard Fellowship supports number of applications and strength of all our candidates! research by a junior scholar (graduate student, untenured For The Robert Giard Fellowship, for instance, we received university professor or independent researcher) and a applications from artists, filmmakers and scholars from senior scholar (tenured university professor or advanced as far as Cairo, Egypt and Beirut, Lebanon. Our fellowship independent scholar) into the impact of lesbians and/or winners are profiled in this newsletter and on our website. gay men on U.S. society and culture. Scholars conducting Please check out our winners to read more about their research on lesbians are especially encouraged to apply. It scholarship and artistic endeavors! is open to researchers both inside and outside the academy The Martin Duberman Fellowship is an endowed fellowship and is adjudicated by the Joan Heller–Diane Bernard named for CLAGS founder and first executive director, Fellowship committee in conjunction with CLAGS. The Martin Duberman, this fellowship is awarded to a senior winner may be asked to participate in CLAGS’s colloquium scholar (tenured university professor or advanced series the following academic year to present her/his independent scholar) from any country doing scholarly research project. research on the lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender/queer Fall 2012, we will be offering these fellowships again, so (LGBTQ) experience. please visit http://www.clags.org for instructions on how The Robert Giard Fellowship is an annual award named for to apply. Robert Giard, a portrait, landscape, and figure photographer whose work often focused on LGBTQ lives and issues, this award is presented to an emerging, early or mid-career artist from any country working in photography, photo- based media, video, or moving image, including short-form Page 11 Page

CLAGS Fellowship Award The Passing the Torch Award A $2,000 award to be given annually for a graduate student, an academic, or an This award recognizes the achievements and promise of an emerging scholar CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS independent scholar for work on a dissertation, first, or second book related. in LGTBQ Studies. The awardee is chosen annually by the CLAGS fellowships The fellowship is open to intellectuals who have demonstrated a significant committee from a list of nominations made by our national advisory board of contribution to the field of gay and lesbian studies. Intended to give the distinguished scholars in the field. scholar the most help possible in furthering her or his work, the fellowship will be able to be used for research, travel, or writing support. The Sylvia Rivera Award in Transgender Studies The Martin Duberman Fellowship This award, which honors the memory of Rivera, a transgender activist, will be given for the best book or article to appear in transgender studies during the An endowed fellowship named for CLAGS founderand first executive director, year. Adjudicated by the CLAGS fellowships committee. Martin Duberman, this fellowship is awarded to a senior scholar (tenured university professor or advanced independent scholar) from any country doing The Paul Monette–Roger Horwitz Dissertation Prize scholarly research on the lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender/queer (LGBTQ) This award, which honors the memories of Monette, a poet and author, and his experience. partner, Horwitz, an attorney, will be given for the best dissertation in LGTBQ The Joan Heller–Diane Bernard Fellowship Studies, broadly defined, by a PhD candidate within the City University of New York system. The dissertation should have been defended in the previous year. This fellowship supports research by a junior scholar (graduate student, Adjudicated by the fellowships committee of the Center for Lesbian and Gay untenured university professor or independent researcher) and a senior Studies. scholar (tenured university professor or advanced independent scholar) into the impact of lesbians and/or gay men on U.S.society and culture. Scholars Graduate Student Paper Award conducting research on lesbians are especially encouraged to apply. It is open Each year, CLAGS sponsors a student paper competition open to all graduate to researchers both inside and outside the academy and is adjudicated by the students enrolled in the CUNY system. A cash prize is awarded to the best Joan Heller–Diane Bernard Fellowship committee in conjunction with CLAGS. paper written in a CUNY graduate class on any topic related to gay, lesbian, The Robert Giard Fellowship bisexual, queer, or transgender experiences. Coming Up An annual award named for Robert Giard, a portrait, landscape, and figure Undergraduate Student Paper Award photographer whose work often focused on LGBTQ lives and issues, this award Each year, CLAGS sponsors a student paper competition open to all is presented to an emerging, early or mid-career artist from any country undergraduate students enrolled in the CUNY or SUNY system. A cash prize is working in photography, photo-based media, video, or moving image, including awarded to the best paper written in a CUNY or SUNY undergraduate class on short-form film or video of no more than 30 minutes in length. This award will In Review any topic related to gay, lesbian, bisexual, queer, or transgender experiences. support a directed project, one that is new or continuing, that addresses issues of sexuality, gender, or LGBTQ identity. Student Travel Award The Kessler Award Each year, CLAGS sponsors two student travel awards open to all graduate students enrolled in the CUNY system. A cash prize is awarded to a student The Kessler award is given to a scholar who has, over a number of years, presenting subject matter that addresses gay, lesbian, bisexual, queer, produced a substantive body of work that has had a significant influence on or transgender issues in their respective field. Presentations can be for the field of GLBTQ Studies. The awardee, who is chosen by the CLAGS Board of conferences held in the U.S. or abroad. Directors, receives a monetary award and gives CLAGS’ annual Kessler Lecture. More information: http://www.clags.org & Recognitions Introductions

AWARD WINNERS

ABEL SIERRA MADERO CARY CRONENWETT MARTIN DUBERMAN FELLOWSHIP GIARD FELLOWSHIP

Abel Sierra Madero holds a PhD in History from the University of Havana (2009). Over Cary Treadwell Cronenwett received the Bay Area Guardian Goldie Award for Local the last ten years, he has worked in the fields of sexuality and gender and their links Discovery after the release of his 2009 film, Maggots and Men (55min). His first to nation-building and nationalism. He has lectured widely in universities in the short film, Phineas Slipped (2002) played extensively in the international LGBT film US, Spain, UK, Italy, Israel and Mexico. He has been awarded the prize Casa de las festival circuit. Currently based in Los Angeles, he is pursuing an MFA in the Film/ Américas for his book Del otro lado del espejo. La sexualidad en la construcción de Video program at CalArts, but is on exchange at Universtät der Kunst in Berlin. He la nación cubana (2006). He has been also been awarded an Erasmus Mundus visiting is in post-production on a documentary/fiction hybrid set in Haiti, which is loosely fellowship and a research grant from Ford Foundation/SEPHIS. He is a member of the based on the novel, Kathy Goes to Haiti, by Kathy Acker. Cuban Union of Writers and Artists (UNEAC). Go with Flo is a personal essay film that describes Cronenwett’s relationship with a Abel Sierra Madero’s third book entitled From the “New Man” to the Transvestism of close friend and creative partner, Flo McGarrell, and revolves around a dream Mc- the State: Heteronormative Nationalism in the Cuban Revolution, studies the role of Garrell had, which caused him to have a realization of his transgender identity and heteronormative nationalism in the construction of the ‘revolutionary’ conscious- ultimately brought them together. ness and the implementation of policies regarding sexuality at the beginning of the Revolution and nowadays. By focusing on “heteronormative nationalism”, he aims to The film is a non-traditional love story that spans the time from when Cronenwett explore the ways the connections between nationalism and heteronormativity have first met McGarrell in 2004 to McGarrell’s memorial service in 2010. Cronenwett is been an integral part of processes of “revolutionary engineering” and politics. This recreating the story from memory with the intent of creating an archival document time, his efforts in historicizing the Cuban nation incorporate a transnational line of that solidifies their relationship. The first person narration will be punctuated by inquiry that he has not explored previously. Although the Cuban Revolution has pro- dates, which suggest that parts of the text are excerpts from diary entries. Archival moted the myth of its political exceptionalism and cultural independence, he illus- footage from a variety of sources piece together a document of visual evidence of trates how transnational models of social engineering travelled across the socialist their work as individuals and as creative partners. Go with Flo will stand on its own bloc and fed a model of both traditional masculinity and socialist morality embodied as a short work (with a run time of 20 minutes), and will eventually be screened as in the concept of the New Man, in vogue during the first decades of the Revolution. a companion piece to Kathy Goes to Haiti, which is a documentary/fiction hybrid that The second part of the book contrasts such initial moments with the (local) state’s revolves around the incomplete narrative (based on the 1978 novel, Kathy Goes to reactions to the new challenges that (global) queer scholarship and activism in- Haiti, by Kathy Acker) McGarrell and Cronenwett were co-directing together at the troduced through the framework of “sexual diversity.” To that end, he will analyze time of McGarrell’s death. This short, experimental narrative film was intended to the contemporary discourses and policies of the state’s National Center of Sexual be part of a longer work based on Acker’s complete novel, which was scheduled for Education (CENESEX) regarding sexual diversity and trans identities. His working completion in summer of 2011, but less than three weeks after wrapping production hypothesis is that such interventions can be understood as manifestations of what on the short, McGarrell died in the earthquake that struck Haiti in January 2010. he defines as “transvestism of the state,” a new set of discursive and policy ad- Go with Flo investigates McGarrell’s impact on the lives of artists, particularly queer justments to the global framework of cultural and sexual “diversity” that translate artists, at FOSAJ art center in Jacmel. A context for interpreting McGarrell’s contri- locally into the state’s co-optation of sexual and political claims. butions to the queer community in Jacmel will be created through lesbian, gay, and transgender Haitians discussing life for queer people in Haiti. MARLON BAILEY 13 Page HELLER–BERNARD FELLOWSHIP 2012

Marlon M. Bailey is an Assistant Professor of Gender Studies and Ameri- can Studies at Indiana University-Bloomington. His is also a Visiting Professor at the Center for AIDS Prevention Studies (CAPS) in the Depart- ment of Medicine at the University of California-San Francisco. Marlon holds a PhD in African American Studies with a Designated Emphasis in Women, Gender, and Sexuality from the University of California-Berkeley.

His forthcoming book manuscript, Butch Queens up in Pumps: Gender, Per- 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS formance and Ballroom Culture in Detroit, is a performance ethnography of the House/Ball community and will be published by the University of Michigan Press. Marlon’s most recent essay, “Gender/Racial Realness: Theorizing the Gender System in Ballroom Culture,” appears in Feminist Studies (2011). engagement in raw sex might constitute a pursuit of sexual autonomy In “I Like it Raw:” Black Gay Sex in the Age of AIDS, Marlon seeks to under- despite the stigmatizing gaze of public health and the larger society. This stand why and how Black gay men engage in raw sex despite the perva- project is a combination of ethnography and discursive analyses. The eth- sive stigma associated with them and their sexual practices in this time nographic dimension will consist of interviews with Black gay men who of high prevalence of HIV among communities of Black gay men and men claim to engage in raw sex in order to learn about their practices and the who have sex with men (MSM). He wants to know if and how raw sex contexts, situations and spaces in which they occur. This project also practices serve as a means through which Black gay men/MSM pursue includes analyses of raw sex pornography and Black, gay, sexual/social sexual pleasure on their own terms despite the stigma associated with networking sites. Ultimately, he intends for this research to contribute to it. Furthermore, he wants to understand the kind of sex that Black gay HIV/AIDS prevention studies by highlighting the pursuit of erotic and raw men/MSM have and the logics that undergird these practices to develop sexual pleasure as an autonomous practice, whereby Black gay men ne- more sex positive and effective HIV prevention strategies. Drawing from gotiate between pleasure and risk, but they are not expected to substitute what M. Jacqui Alexander refers to as erotic autonomy and Cathy J. Co- pleasure for “safe sex.” hen’s notion of deviance as resistance, he theorizes how Black gay men’s

EMILY THUMA HELLER–BERNARD FELLOWSHIP 2012 Coming Up

Emily Thuma received her Ph.D. in American Studies from New York Uni- versity in September 2011. Her research and teaching focus in gender and sexuality studies and modern U.S. social and cultural history, with particular emphasis in the politics of violence, citizenship, and social movements. The completion of her dissertation, “‘Not a Wedge, But a Bridge:’ Prisons, Feminist Activism, and the Politics of Gendered Violence, In Review 1968-1987,” was supported by the American Fellowship from the Ameri- can Association of University Women and the NYU Dean’s Dissertation Fellowship. She currently teaches Queer Studies and Comparative Ethnic Studies at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington. Thuma is currently revising her dissertation into a book manuscript. The project writes a history of U.S.-based feminist opposition to intimate and interventions was a far more contested and uneven process than has pre- state violence against women in the 1970s and 1980s that emphasizes viously been considered. She asks how activists’ differential relationships antiracist and queer initiatives. By investigating the collective actions of to systems of incarceration and policing, and to movements for prisoners’ radical women of color and white women, lesbian women, and institu- and mental patients’ rights, gay and lesbian liberation, and racial justice, tionalized and imprisoned women, Thuma shows that the mainstreaming shaped how they organized around violence and imagined ideas of safety, justice, and redress. of gendered violence as a target of law enforcement and mental health & Recognitions Introductions

CLAGS EVENTS AND OUTREACH 2012

BY BENJAMIN GILLESPIE

I am very proud of what CLAGS has accom- social networking resources, our newly re- also attract academics from surrounding plished through our events and outreach designed website, and our bi-annual news- universities and members of the LGBTQ programs over the past year. Despite a dire letter, all helped us reach this goal. community. CLAGS welcomes all to our free financial situation and limited resources, events and we are committed to maintain an CLAGS offered a vibrant calendar of events CLAGS continues to increase communica- open dialogue with the public we serve. as we continued to partner with many mem- tion with its members and seeks feedback bers of the community in order to create a in order to improve our events. Feedback I look forward to another exciting year and challenging and diverse platform for intel- given for the 2011/12 year was resoundingly hope to see you at all of our events, entering lectual leadership and conversation sur- positive and many people who attended our into the stimulating discourse taking place rounding LGBTQ issues in the medium of events have now become CLAGS members. in LGBTQ studies at CLAGS. colloquia, seminars, conferences, fellow- I encourage anyone reading this letter to ships and awards ceremonies, and lecture contact CLAGS with any feedback and/or series. proposals for events. If you are interested in proposing an event, you can visit our web- In the past year, I am happy to report that site, where information on this process is attendance rates at our events have doubled listed, or email to [email protected]. from previous years, and our ongoing goal to increase these numbers through our Many who attend our events are Graduate multiple outreach programs, which include Center students and faculty; however, we

The Homonationalism and Pinkwashing conference will examine global queer resistance and complicity in international relations. Activists and scholars will convene and bring together theoretical and applied perspectives, focusing on queer future, movements,

JASBIR PUAR JUDITH BUTLER RABIH ALAMEDDINE HANEEN MAIKEY and efforts.

Homonationalism and CUNY Graduate Center, New York Pinkwashing April 10–13, 2013

This page contains advertisements. KESSLER CONVERSATIONS 2012 15 Page

The Kessler Conversations celebrated award winner Monique Wittig, New York Lesbian Taskforce from 1989-1992 and again 20 years of the Kessler Lectureship and artists Chitra Ganesh, Simone Leigh and from 1997-2000, and built it to become the na- were spread across the 2011/12 academic curator Dean Daderko discussed making tion’s pre-eminent lgbt rights organization. She year. The award was initiated in 1991 by work in today’s art world that embodies has worked at the Ford Foundation and served as Dr. Martin Duberman, CLAGS’s Founding the uncompromising spirit of pioneers like Executive Director of the Arcus Foundation from 2005 to 2010. She is the author of Virtual Equal- Director (who will be receiving the award Wittig. For more information on speakers ity: The Mainstreaming of Gay and Lesbian Lib- this fall) and with the financial support and lecture topics, please see CLAGS’s eration. Later this year, Magnus Books will pub- 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS of David Kessler. In place of an award, Spring 2012 Newsletter. lish her new book, Irresistible Revolution: Race, CLAGS thought it would be valuable to Class and the LGBT Imagination. Vaid was a have multiple past Kessler Award winners SPRING 2012 Visiting Senior Fellow with the City University of speak on emergent LGBTQ issues and the New York (CUNY) Graduate Center’s Department history of queer studies in their individual Out of the Ivory Closet: Scholars and Activ- of Sociology during the 2010-2011 academic fields. This series also brought in emerg- ists on the Frontlines year. In April 2009 Out magazine named her one of the 50 most influential people in the United ing researchers and practitioners to help The celebration of CLAGS twentieth anniversary States. evaluate where we have been and where continued with the Kessler Conversation be- we are going in the field of LGBTQ studies. tween Susan Stryker, Kessler Lecturer in 2008, Susan Stryker is an Associate Professor of Gen- and Urvashi Vaid, Kessler Lecturer in 2010. This der and Women’s Studies and the Director of In Fall 2011, Kessler speakers included: conversation opened up a dialogue on the impor- the Institute for LGBT Studies at the University Edmund White in conversation with fic- tant link between scholarship and activism with of Arizona. She was the Executive Director of tion writer Rakesh Satyal on the changing two activists/scholars who have been on the the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco. face of queer fiction; American cultural frontline of LGBT politics for more than twenty Stryker’s most recent book is Transgender His- anthropologists Esther Newton, Gayle Ru- years. tory (Seal Press 2008). She is also the co-editor bin, and Carole Vance discussed the value of The Transgender Studies Reader (Routledge Urvashi Vaid is the Director of the Engaging 2006), which has won a Lambda Book Award. of ethnographic methodologies within the Tradition Project at the Center for Gender and She won an Emmy Award for the documentary study of sexual subcultures in the U.S.; Sexuality Law at Columbia Law School. She was film Screaming Queens: The Riot at Compton’s and lastly, in memory of late Kessler the Executive Director of the National Gay and Cafeteria (Frameline/ITVS 2005). Coming Up SPECIAL EVENTS IN SPRING 2012 In Review

For more information on these events, only print journal dedicated to the gay poet. gave the 2011 Audre Lorde/Essex Hemphill or to access recordings, please contact: Poets read together, legend alongside rising star; Memorial Lecture. This lecture is meant to com- [email protected]. established artist next to emerging artist. The memorate the lives of the American poets Audre event showcased the collective voices of some Lorde (1934 -1992) and Essex Hemphill (1957 Rainbow Book Fair Kickoff – Assaracus: A of gay poetry’s brightest contemporary writers in -1995), as well as encourage exciting scholarship Celebration of Gay Poetry To kick off the one place, at one time, and featured the launch and literary production within the communities to Rainbow Book Fair, CLAGS and Sibling Rivalry of Assaracus: Issue 06. whom their poetry and prose spoke. Co-sponsored Press presented poets from the first six issues of by CLAGS, the CUNY Center for the Humanities, and Assaracus: A Journal of Gay Poetry—the world’s Endowed Lecture: Scenes from a Jamaican the NYPL. Childhood Thomas Glave (SUNY Binghamton) & Recognitions Introductions

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KESSLER CONVERSATIONS (cont’d)

Aids/Activism/Art: Looking Backward/ and Queer Politics exploring, among other top- New York Lesbian and Gay Experimental Film Looking Forward ics, the link between artistic representations Festival (now called MIX) to establish the ACT of mourning and militant activism. Since 1991, UP Oral History Project and has produced (with The final installment of CLAGS Kessler Con- Crimp has taught in the visual and cultural Hubbard) a feature-length documentary en- versations series was able to bring together studies program at the University of Rochester titled United in Anger: The History of ACT UP past Kessler Lecturers Douglas Crimp (2007) where he is now the Fanny Knapp Allen Profes- based on oral history archives. Schulman is a and Sarah Schulman (2009) along with critic sor of Art History. Distinguished Professor of the Humanities at and curator Nathan Lee. Moderated by CLAGS the College of Staten Island, CUNY. Board Director Daniel Hurewitz, the panelists Sarah Schulman is a novelist, essayist, play- discussed the AIDS crisis, AIDS activism, and wright and filmmaker. She has written on AIDS Nathan Lee is a critic and a curator of the mov- the political role of art in organizing the LGBT since the beginning of the epidemic. The author ing image. A former critic of the New York Times, community and creating awareness of the epi- of popular and well-received novels such as Af- the Village Voice and NPR, he is a contributing demic’s impact and promoting the LGBT com- ter Delores, People Trouble, and Rat Bohemia, in editor of Film Comment. Among his curatorial munity’s response to historical trauma of AIDS. 1995 she published My American History: Lesbi- projects have been Buddy List, at Space 414, Both Crimp and Schulman were active in ACT UP an and Gay Life during the Reagan/Bush Years, a Brooklyn; Picturing the Shoah at the YIVO Cen- and contributed their skills as writers, critics, collection of her journalism that chronicles the ter for Jewish Research in New York; and A/B journalists and artists to the AIDS movement. years of conservative disregard for LGBT issues Machines: A Cautionary Tale at the Black Door and includes coverage of the evolution of the in Istanbul. He is also a program associate at Douglas Crimp is a critic and queer theorist who AIDS crisis. Since 2001, Schulman has worked Platform Garanti in Istanbul. served as the editor of October, a leading jour- with Jim Hubbard, with whom she founded the nal of cultural and art criticism from 1977 to 1990. As an editor of October, Crimp published a special entitled “AIDS: Cultural Analysis/Cul- tural Activism,” which helped to articulate the political and cultural challenge of the AIDS cri- sis. In 1990, he published (with Adam Rolston) AIDS Demo Graphics, which illustrated the role artists had in creating an increased public awareness of the stigma and social inequities that AIDS created. In 2002 Crimp published Melancholia and Moralism: Essays on AIDS Aids/Activism/Art: Looking Backward/Looking Forward Panel Participants, Picture: Kalle Westerling.

SPECIAL EVENTS IN SPRING 2012 (cont’d)

Retro(Per)spectives: Alisa Solomon and Split (and past CLAGS Executive Director) and Peggy Britches in Conversation Renowned queer Shaw and Lois Weaver of Split Britches in order performance group Split Britches were honored to discuss the impact of their past work and as the recipients of the Edwin Booth Award, their continual influence on queer performance bestowed each year to an individual or organiza- across the globe. Co-sponsored by CLAGS, the tion who has made a substantial contribution to Doctoral Theatre Student’s Association (DTSA), the American theatre and performance in New York. Doctoral Student’s Association, and Mise en Scene. CLAGS hosted a panel discussion with renowned theatre scholar and journalist Alisa Solomon Page 17 Page CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS

2012 RAINBOW BOOK FAIR: EVEN BIGGER AND BETTER BY SARAH CHINN

Almost 100 vendors, taking up almost the Fairgoers also had the opportunity to hear lisher Perry Brass. And for the first time the entire LGBT Community Center; rooms filled major queer and trans writers read from and RBF included a panel on comics and graphic with books, panels, readings, poetry; thou- talk about their work. Christopher Bram, novels. We were lucky enough to have artists sands of people browsing, reading, talking, Justin Vivan Bond, Laurie Weeks, Paul Rus- who were among the founders of the queer and listening: that’s what you would have sell, and James Earl Hardy all read from new comix movement, Jennifer Camper and Ivan seen if you’d wandered into the Center this work and participated in lively question and Velez, as well as contemporary web comix past March 24th and found yourself in the answer sessions. Equally compelling was the artists A.K. Summers, Chuck McKinney, and middle of the Fourth Annual Rainbow Book roster of panels spotlighting writers, pub- Chino. And Nathaniel Siegel and Regie Cabico Fair. CLAGS has been sponsoring the Fair for lishers, and scholars on a variety of topics. reprised their hugely popular Poetry Salon, in the past three years, and it has grown sig- We partnered with Visual AIDS to organize which dozens of poets read from their work. Coming Up nificantly over that time. a groundbreaking panel on contemporary AIDS writing, and photographer Reed Mas- Our goal for 2013 is to reach out more suc- The Rainbow Book Fair is the largest queer sengill curated a panel on Queer Art Books cessfully to mainstream and larger univer- book expo in North America and is now that featured such influential authors as sity presses, who have backed away from spawning similar events around the U.S., queer writers and readers since the “golden Vince Aletti, the renowned photography critic In Review most recently the OutWrite Expo in Wash- and Chris Steighner, a senior editor at Riz- age” of queer publishing in the early 1990s. ington, DC. Designed to provide space for zoli Books. The room holding the panel on As this year’s RBF shows, there’s a large and the diversity of queer, trans, and gender- Queer Latinidad was packed -- not surpris- enthusiastic audience for LGBT books. Plan- nonconforming writers and publishers -- es- ingly, considering the participants: : Charles ning for the 5th Rainbow Book Fair is already pecially small and academic presses -- the Rice-Gonzalez, Miguel Angel Angeles, Yoseli underway: we’ll see you next March! RBF’s main event is its two exhibition halls. Castillo Fuertes, Karen Jaime, and Charlie Exhibitors ranged from the much-beloved Vazquez. Our panel on Queer Literary New Bluestockings Bookshop to a bevy of LGBT York was equally star-studded: Chris Bram, romance publishers to small poetry presses Edmund White, and Steve Watson, moderat- like Bench Press Books and Sibling Rivalry ed by long-time gay poet, novelist, and pub- Press. & Recognitions Introductions

VISITING SCHOLARS SERIES

The Visiting Scholars Series was de- “Queer Inhumanism” first half of the century, policies of secrecy veloped out of the plethora of exciting Chrysanthi Nigianni and containment prevailed, protecting a proposals we received from U.S.-based In her presentation, Chrysanthi Nigianni person’s initial inscription as man or woman and international scholars and re- mobilized queerness as primarily an act in society in order to avoid social disorder searchers who wanted to present their of jeopardizing our poststructuralist con- and dislocation. Increasingly, an urge to re- work through CLAGS. Three scholars victions and our theoretical and political veal the ‘inner truth’ of the body emerged. were chosen to present on widely vary- edifice grounded on secured notions of This had to be understood and ‘managed’ in ing topics in divergent fields of study, freedom, radicalism, difference, and mar- its relation to an interiorized sex of the self. drawing together a diverse group of gins (the latter sustaining a humanist The physician’s role thereby transformed scholars, artists, and community philosophical tradition), calling for the es- from being an expert arbiter in cases in members. cape from queer’s normalization within the which doubtful sex caused a social prob- lem, into offering medical-psychological For more information on how to become routes of the inhuman, the a-subjective, the pre-personal as alternative scripts stand- advice and therapy concerning the individu- a CLAGS Visiting Scholar, visits our alized problem of the relation between body website or email [email protected]. ing outside the Law of Language, the Law of the Father, and the the Law of the Hu- and self. PRESENTATIONS Man. Rather than making claims for broader participation, or for wider recognition, a “Word Is Out and the Gay Liberal Turn” “becoming-minoritarian,” Nigianni argued, Greg Youmans will create a space for the singular to be voiced and heard. Queer film scholar Greg Youmans (UC Santa Cruz) presented a lecture about the ground- “Doubting Sex: How bodies Changed breaking 1977 gay and lesbian documentary and Selves Appeared in Nineteenth- Word Is Out: Stories of Some of Our Lives. Century Hermaphrodite Case Histories” Youmans discussed the role Word Is Out Geertje Mak played in the gay-rights struggles of the In her lecture, Geertje Mak showed that late 1970s and the contributions of the film hermaphroditism itself changed profoundly to the rise of a U.S. gay national imaginary over the course of the nineteenth century, and the consolidation of gay liberalism noting that until the 1860s, in cases of during the era, as well as its relationship doubt, a person’s sex was medically exam- to other queer media projects of the 1970s ined on the basis of outer appearance and that took different aesthetic forms and had the patient’s own statements mainly. In the conflicting political aims. LAMMIES 19 Page THE 24TH ANNUAL LAMBDA

BY JAMES WILSON LITERARY AWARDS

The LGBT literati hobnobbed with the NYC after winner paid tribute to the foundational 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS glitterati for the 24th Annual Lambda Lit- work of Armistead Maupin, who received a erary Awards on June 4th. CLAGS co-spon- 2012 Pioneer Award. Maupin, who is the au- sored the Lammies in the Graduate Center’s thor of nine novels, including the addictive Proshansky Auditorium, and the sold-out Tales of the City series, movingly accepted event, hosted by Kate Clinton, was a fabu- his award stating, “The great pleasure of lous affair. The only thing missing were the writing is that people come up to you and klieg lights dancing on the façade of the tell you you’ve touched them in some way.” Graduate Center, but all other elements of Feminist, writer, filmmaker, and sculptor glitzy award show rituals were in place. Kate Millett also received a 2012 Pioneer Award. Millett, the author of Sexual Politics, After walking a red carpet leading to the was clearly moved by the extraordinary ova- VIP photo op stop, guests were treated tion that greeted her, and in her acceptance to a sumptuous reception with solicitous speech, she explained that literary and po- cater waiters weaving their way through litical accolades aside, these days she con- the crowd. (Hint: park it in the back of the siders herself a “farmer,” first and foremost. room for first dibs on each new platter of delectables as it glides out of the kitchen). On hand to offer the audience a special Lypsinka , Picture courtesy of Lambda Literary Awards Standing shoulder to shoulder with the likes treat was Lypsinka (a.k.a. John Epperson), Butterfield 8, and Caged. Not to be outdone of Charles Busch, Olympia Dukakis, Frank who was exceedingly glamorous and fierce by the proceedings onstage, Lypsinka con- Coming Up Bruni, Anthony Rapp, and Ally Sheedy, I was in a fiery red frock with crimson hair to cluded her performance accepting her own the only one there I never heard of! match. Lypsinka performed her signature Academy Award. schizophrenic telephone medley, brilliantly The award ceremony was appropriately cel- mashing moments from Mommie Dearest, What awards show would be complete with- ebratory and at times quite moving. Winner out swag? Guests received a bag full of books on their way out of the ceremony and In Review were plied with hours of summer reading selections. The after-party, featuring drag superstar Lady Bunny, went into the wee hours at Midtown Manhattan’s popular hotspot Slate. This award-show enthusiast went home to read. Olympia Dukakis and Armistead Maupin, Picture Charles Busch , Picture courtesy of Lambda Literary

courtesy of Lambda Literary Awards Awards & Recognitions Introductions

SEMINAR IN THE CITY SPRING 2012 QUEERING THE CURRICULUM BY CHRISTOPHER MITCHELL

Just last summer, California legislators passed SB48, a bill that requires Cali- in history, but to challenge teachers and students to ask questions about how fornia’s State Board of Education to adopt textbooks and curricular materials normative power has worked historically, and how change has happened. A that explore the historical contributions of LGBTQ people. This ambitious law long-time community educator and activist, Moore suggested the group di- not only ensures that California’s public schools teach queer history, but also vide their sessions into “buckets” in order to diversify the curricular vision influence and shape the curriculum in many other states across the country. and maximize the strengths and fluencies of the group’s individual members. The potential effects of an LGBTQ component in history and social studies cur- Planners also worked hard to think about “queering” the curriculum in a ricula seem boundless, from empowering educators to introduce students to multi-dimensional way to avoid paving over the diversity and differences of the contributions of historical actors as diverse as Djuna Barnes, Bayard Rus- race, class, and gender in the same way that conventional “straight” histories tin, Pauline Park, or California’s own Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin, to address- erase sexual diversity. Unlike typical Seminars in the City—which are gener- ing the widespread and tragic consequences of transphobic and homophobic ally more open to the public and concentrated in consecutive weeknights over bullying in the classroom. a month—the facilitators decided to to expand each of these thematic buckets over four Saturday sessions spread throughout the spring semester in order to While the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies applauds the California bill and accommodate educators’ schedules. similar efforts in New York State, an inestimable number of educators have already taken the courageous risks and proactive steps to introduce queer As New York City literature and science teachers, respectively, Jesse Chanin history into their own classrooms. Last summer, as legislators in California and Kevin Connell seemed the most obvious candidates to inaugurate the first worked overtime to ensure the passage of SB48, SUNY–New Paltz Professor Seminar in the City, an introductory workshop exploring their own best prac- Rachel Mattson conducted a seminar with local educators entitled “Queer- tices in “queering” the curriculum in their own classrooms. Historians and ing the Curriculum.” As part of the Pop-Up Museum of Queer History’s SoHo teachers Hugh Ryan and Chris Mitchell tackled the general lack of information Exhibit at the Leslie/Lohman Gallery (now The Leslie + Lohman Museum of about queer history by exploring the intersections of the Homophile and Gay Gay and Lesbian Art)—a pioneering public history exhibit to which CLAGS was Liberation Movements with broader notions of civil rights in U.S. history, espe- privileged to contribute—“Queering the Curriculum” brought together educa- cially the African-American Civil Rights Movement. Christine Hou and Rachel tors and community organizers in order to share best practices and tackle Mattson created a session to think differently gender and sexuality both in curricular topics from classroom transphobia and homophobia to the ways we the curriculum, through an examination of art and poetry, as well as ways to interpret and think about gender and sexuality in the past and the present. confront norms around gender and sexuality in the classroom interactions of students, educators, and other staff. Darnell Moore and Sam Stiegler brought CLAGS’ staff and board members were therefore understandably thrilled when their expertise from the Hetrick-Martin Institute in order to lead a workshop on Mattson and Pop-Up Museum founder and director Hugh Ryan approached de- classroom and school culture and the day-to-day interactions between queer velopment director Lauren Gutterman with a proposal for the spring Seminar students and their teachers, families, and administrators. They also intro- in the City: an expanded series of workshops based on the “Queering the Cur- duced our Seminar to co-facilitators from Hetrick–Martin Lillian Rivera, Direc- riculum” seminar. In the early fall, Rachel, Hugh, and CLAGS’ board members Daniel Hurewitz and Chris Mitchell worked to build a coalition of educators and administrators who could facilitate workshops for teachers and community educators in New York City. We were soon joined by New York City Department of Education teachers Jesse Chanin and Kevin Connell, the Hetrick–Martin Institute’s Education Initiatives Director Darnell Moore and Assistant Director of After-School Services Sam Stiegler, the Dia Art Foundation’s Christine Hou, as well as New York University Professor Robbie Cohen, who helped provide additional funding and co-sponsorship through NYU’s Steinhardt School of Education.

From the outset, the planning committee wanted to challenge the tokenism that too often infects so-called “minority” histories—what the astute (not to mention witty!) Ryan referred to as the “add-a-gay and stir” approach. Mattson challenged planners not to just think about teaching about queers Picture: Todd Binger/Flickr, http://www.flickr.com/photos/toddbinger.

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tor of Advocacy and Capacity Building; Cindy Molina, G.E.D. Coordinator; and City. Perhaps this network will even be part of an effort to persuade New Mara Hughes, a Ph.D. candidate in Rutgers University’s Graduate School of York State’s legislature to follow California’s tack in refusing the distortions Education, who led a discussion about the ways in which racism, issues of and absences that characterize too many social studies and history cur- class and poverty, and gender compact homophobia and transphobia in the ricula. As Professor Cohen lately reminded the planners, “It seems to me classroom. that if California can mandate a whole curriculum, New York can at least 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS be pressured to take some steps to end its disconnect from this LGBTQ The response to Seminar in the City: Queering the Curriculum was truly history.” overwhelming. Over fifty teachers, community educators, and activists from public schools, independent schools, colleges and universities, museums, Thanks first and foremost to the dedicated educators who gave up their and even community gardens responded to the initial announcement. Edu- Saturdays to collaborate in these Seminars. Special thanks to the incred- cators in attendance worked with age groups from very early childhood into ibly talented group of educators who brought this project to CLAGS’ atten- adult education, covering a wide range of subjects and interests. Educators tion and to the planners who worked tirelessly to facilitate the Seminars in also used the sessions to share their own best practices with one another, the City. CLAGS also wishes to thank the Hetrick–Martin Institute, Lillian to brainstorm about future lesson planning, and to think about moving for- Rivera, Cindy Molina, Mara Hughes, the Pop-Up Museum of Queer History, ward with administrators, staff, and students’ families in their own schools. Professor Robbie Cohen and the Steinhardt School of Education for co- Just as importantly, teachers forged connections among themselves in a sponsorship and co-funding, and Hugh Ryan and the Urban Justice Center, network that continues to have a life of its own beyond the Seminar in the which provided time and physical accommodation for the Seminars.

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CLAGS relies on the generous nancial A Women of Color rt by Jaz Cruz Jaz by Y support of our members to help us to

A continue and provide our fellowships 2 Calls for Participation awards, create public events and to help the larger LGBT community. This past O D year, 154 individuals became members of Rivers of Honey Cabaret CLAGS or renewed their memberships, CALL FOR ARTISTS

thereby reaf rming their commitment to Coming Up Burlesque, Comedy, Visual Art, Short atrical Films, The Performance, CLAGS and the work that we do. Performance Poetry, Vocal & Instrumentalists, and more… We are so grateful to all members, new Deadline: Rolling and old, for showing us that the work we Rivers of Honey is a monthly Cabaret highlighting the art of do at CLAGS is integral to the Womyn of Color. All performances are held on the first Friday of advancement and ourishing of LGBT every month, at the WOW Cafe Theater on East 4th street in NYC. issues around the globe. Apply online at riversofhoney.com In Review If you have not joined yet or need to renew your membership, please visit Her Saturn Returns Anthology www.clags.org and click on the red Queer Women of Color Life Transitions banner on the home page. Our CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS membership rates start at $40, and $20 Payment: Anthology Copy Deadline: October 15th, 2012 for students and those on a xed income.

Thank you for your support! Her Saturn Returns, a blog-turned-anthology on Queer Women of Color Life Transitions is seeking in 2500 words or less, non-fiction essays, memoir, interviews, poetry and other forms of documentary writing. Pieces are by or about women who are experiencing their 1st Saturn Return -turning 30, or their 2nd Saturn Return -turning 60. All women who identify as queer, lesbian, or bisexual, and of & Recognitions Introductions BECOME A MEMBER T CLAGS color may submit. Submit at hersaturnreturns.com

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Queer Women of Color Life Transitions POSITIONING THE RADICAL AN INTERVIEW WITH MARTIN DUBERMAN KESSLER AWARD RECIPIENT 2012

Benjamin Gillespie (CLAGS Events and Outreach Coordinator,

PhD. student in theatre) interviews Professor Martin Duberman about his life as a historian, playwright, scholar, and activist; his recent honorary degree from Amherst College; and being awarded the 2012 Kessler Award. Benjamin Gillespie (BG) You were recently awarded an honorary doctoral degree from Amherst College for your prolific and groundbreaking career, as It wasn’t that we wanted to become well as your passion for honoring the pasts of those that live in the “margins of our society.” In your keynote address, you critiqued the assimilationist focus accepted members of established of the national gay rights agenda, which features marriage and the military as its central components, and—paraphrasing your words—ignores the needs of institutions; it was rather that we the lower economic factions of queer society within the American corporate capitalist system. Seeing as Amherst is a liberal institution, how was this wanted to change the institutions. critique received? Rather than being allowed to join Martin Duberman (MD) I had wondered whether or not there would be some hostility, but anyone who said anything—at least subsequent to the speech— the military, we wanted to challenge was positive about it and agreed with me. One young guy said, “it’s amazing that someone as old as you are would have radical ideas!” the whole idea of war and state- BG Radical ideas are something you have had for a long time. Perhaps the sanctioned killing. The whole war audience at Amherst appreciated your critique more than some gays, who are pushing instead for assimilation and integration. machine was our target and we MD Sure. It was, of course, a self-selected audience. And Amherst is liberal—even more than it used to be. Its outgoing president, Anthony Marx, weren’t eager to put on the uniform. has recently been named head of the library system in New York. In the past, he made sure that a number of Africans received scholarships to Amherst College. whole war machine was our target and we weren’t eager to put on the uniform. It was interesting how many of the students that were there were minorities. It The same is true of marriage. As gay people, we learned a great deal about wasn’t that long ago that it was completely white and male. relationships that perhaps mainstream America didn’t know or wasn’t willing to BG That is another part of your critique, isn’t it? That the assimilationist acknowledge, in terms of the roles people play in a partnered relationship. The agenda is generally geared toward the upper-middle-class white male? studies that have been done make it very clear that gay relationships (and I mean MD Certainly. But that’s hardly surprising. It has always been that way. gay inclusively—lesbian, trans, queer, etc.) tend to be much more egalitarian than heterosexual ones. Also, there is the whole issue of monogamous marriage. BG And this was the first time Amherst awarded an honorary doctorate I think that there is a wide spectrum of different kinds of gay relationships: to a “marginalized person,” correct? In the description I quoted earlier, it is some are monogamous; some are “open”; some are sexual for a time, but then interesting how they never mention gay or queer, but use the language of become companionable. “marginalizaton.” Do you have any thoughts on this? Radicals still don’t accept that institutions currently structured are in any sense MD I think that it is all code for gay. Well, not all gay. Back in 1963, I wrote universal or maximally indicate human needs. In our point of view, we don’t want a play called “In White America” about being black in white America, which to join up. Yes, we want all the rights everybody else has. But at the same time, continues to be performed. When they say, “live on the margins,” I think the we want the right to challenge traditional institutions. The original GLF differed reference is also to race, not just sexual orientation. much from today’s politics. We don’t want merely to be good patriotic citizens BG I think another word they could have used was ‘radical.’ You often because there is a lot wrong with national values and national policies and we distinguish between liberal and radical political positions, identifying yourself want to challenge those. as a radical because you are someone who has struggled and continues BG Let’s move to something more personal. To quote you in Cures: A Gay to fight to substantially restructure the system itself, rather than push for Man’s Odyssey, you state, “It was easier for me to harangue the country about LGBT integration into the system as it currently exists. Can you say anything changing its ways than to change my own; perhaps because—a notion I can only more about this distinction and how it has influenced your career as a gay entertain in retrospect—the country really did need to remake itself, whereas I historian? did not.” Here, you were referring to having an optimistic viewpoint when it came MD It does seem to me that being allowed “in” to to the country’s politics, but a more negative opinion of your own struggle with mainstream culture is not the goal that the Gay a gay identity that you hadn’t yet accepted. Liberation Front (GLF) originally aimed at. It wasn’t Looking at this experience retrospectively here, you point out your own guilty that we wanted to become accepted members of conscience, which essentially pushed you to want to conform (at that time) established institutions; it was rather that we to mainstream heterosexual value systems and beliefs. Thinking about your wanted to change the institutions. Rather talk at Amherst, this still seems to me to be a prevalent problem—that is, gay than being allowed to join the military, we assimilationism and the guilty conscience of queer radicalism. wanted to challenge the whole idea of war and state-sanctioned killing. The MD Some of this may be generational, but shame and guilt remain elements of the gay personality, simply because that is do the lecture myself and have Dave be present don’t think anybody knows much about how his how we were raised—to feel ashamed of our for it. or her own inner workings and evolution. To take orientation and guilty about it. And even though BG What will you talk about? one example, I know when I was growing up, and you know better or learn better, as you become straight through college, I was hardly a political part of a community and become politically MD I was originally going to talk about how radical. I’d like to say that it was public events active, there remains an emotional residue that CLAGS began, but I’m afraid too much of it that educated me, but I don’t think anyone can cannot be fully erased, even if you know its would be unfamiliar to the audience. The kinds know for sure the sources of their motivation. of issues being raised back then might be too foolish. It’s deeply imprinted on us, especially BG CLAGS just celebrated its official 20th for those today who grow up in rural areas or in boring for a current audience [laughs.]. I think I will talk about anti-assimilationism. It is a far anniversary last year—a remarkable feat for a small towns and cities where the freedoms of center fostering LGBT studies, and one that has places like New York don’t exist. There is still a more immediate event, since Obama has just come out in favor of gay marriage. harnessed a consistent radical queer agenda. great imprinting of shame. What do you see as the central issue(s) that But you make a good point. It means assimilation BG In your lecture at Amherst, you also should be in focus at CLAGS now and in the years is the equivalent of acceptance. If you are brought up Obama’s recent endorsement of gay to come? accepted by the mainstream, you no longer have marriage. Even with all the media attention it has received, it seems to me that his personal MD It was really CLAGS’ twenty-fifth to be ashamed of your differentness, and even anniversary. It was 1986 when I first gathered beyond that, you no longer have to see yourself acceptance of the issue is not going to put into motion the changes that need to be made, which a few people in my apartment to talk about the as different. And that’s one of the reasons I possibilities of what became CLAGS. It took five react negatively to assimilationism. I feel we is clear in cases like North Carolina, where marriage and even civil unions have been barred. years of work and planning. We were warmly are different: we grow up as outsiders and that welcomed at the CUNY Graduate Center from the affects our perspectives and values. And we Even if marriage is a side-stepping issue—one that avoids the larger economic problems for beginning, but it was made clear to us that we don’t want to throw that subcultural awareness had to raise $50,000 to prove we were viable as a away in order to be accepted as “just folks.” queers in the U.S.— it is still the public issue right now, and therefore we can’t ignore it. Center before we could get formal accreditation. BG It has recently been announced that you So it all really began twenty-five years ago—we were selected to receive the Kessler Award in the I think discussing anti-assimilationism in this were just not formally accredited until 1991. Our fall for your significant influence in LGBT studies arena will allow you to receive the attention you first public conference was in 1987 on “Gay Life and the body of work you have produced in this deserve for your sustained commitment to gay in New York.” radicalism. area. As the founder of CLAGS, its Executive BG Are there any current projects you are Director for the first decade of its existence, and MD Thank you. As for Obama, at least he working on? a continued supporter of its efforts, this award recognized it [gay marriage] and took a clear must have a special significance for you—a full position on it. But I do feel strongly about the MD Type A’s ALWAYS have a current project! circle kind of significance. Can you say anything lack of economic equality and opportunity in the For the last few years I’ve been working on a more about that? country and about the need sharply to narrow biography of Howard Zinn, the political radical between rich and poor. As of now the country and historian who wrote the best-selling book, A MD For starters, I can tell you a bit more People’s History of the United States. His family about how the Kessler Awards came about. Dave closer to being a corporate oligarchy than a democracy. has opened up all his archives to me, so it’s Kessler and I had known each other since our the first time his story has been told. He was a graduate school days, and we had stayed in touch BG How is it that you’ve been able to balance remarkable human being. The biography will be through the years. When I started CLAGS, I knew your research, activism, and teaching for all of published by The New Press on October 1 [www. that Dave had done very well as a psychiatrist, these years, building up such a rich profile that thenewpress.com]. I’ve also recently completed and so I approached him about endowing this has been recognized by so many accolades? Against the Grain: A Martin Duberman Reader. It lectureship. I didn’t have to do any sort of hard MD I doubt if that question can be answered-- includes selections from my various books and sell. Dave saw it as a worthwhile idea and gave for example, why I became a writer instead of, say, essays, and The New Press will be publishing it CLAGS $100,000. With that endowment, we’ve a lawyer. People develop their own mechanisms in the spring of 2013. been able to continue to give this award. I guess for coping with life’s stresses, and for me, it’s it is especially nice for me—feeling full circle— always been important to stay busy. Writers are because the award emerged from a personal rarely laid back, relaxed types. They tend to be friendship. And the Kessler award has turned out classic Type A’s--at their happiest when at their to be a successful community event. The first ten most productive. Even today, I keep involved- years were produced as a book. It will be nice to -writing, reading, staying abreast politically. I RECENT PUBLICATIONS BY 25 Page MARTIN DUBERMAN CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS

HOWARD ZINN: A LIFE ON THE LEFT A SAVING REMNANT The New Press, Fall 2012 The New Press, Paperback, Spring 2012

Howard Zinn was perhaps the best-known and most widely By the time their paths first crossed in the 1960s, Barbara celebrated popular interpreter of American history in the Deming and David McReynolds had each charted a unique twentieth century, renowned as a bestselling author, a course through the political and social worlds of the political activist, a lecturer, and one of America’s most American left. Deming, a feminist, journalist, and political Coming Up recognizable and admired progressive voices. activist with an abiding belief in nonviolence, had been an out lesbian since the age of sixteen. The first openly gay man Zinn was at the heart of the signal events of modern to run for president of the United States, on the Socialist American history—from the battlefields of World War II to the Party ticket, McReynolds was also a longtime opponent McCarthy era, the civil rights and the antiwar movements, of the Vietnam War—he was among the first activists to and beyond. A bombardier who later renounced war, a publicly burn a draft card after this became a felony—and son of working-class parents who earned a doctorate at friend to leading activists and artists from Bayard Rustin to In Review Columbia, a white professor who taught at the historically Quentin Crisp. black Spelman College in Atlanta, a committed scholar who will be forever remembered as a devoted “people’s In this remarkable dual biography, Duberman reveals a vital historian.” historical milieu of activism, radical ideas, and coming to terms with homosexuality when the gay rights movement Howard Zinn blazed a bold, iconoclastic path through the was still in its nascent stages. With a cast of characters turbulent second half of the twentieth century. For the that includes intellectuals, artists, and activists from the millions who were moved by Zinn’s personal example of critic Edmund White and the writer Mary McCarthy to the political engagement and by his inspiring “bottom up” young Alvin Ailey and Allen Ginsberg, A Saving Remnant history, Duberman has written the first biography of this is a brilliant achievement from one of our most important towering figure. historians. & Recognitions Introductions

CLAGS EVENTS FALL CALENDAR 2012

10/26 7PM–9PM NINA ARSENAULT WITH J. PAUL HALFERTY 9/27–9/30 PERFORMING QUE(E)RIES SERIES PART I CLAGS CONFERENCE Trans performer, playwright, and from her repertoire of critically writer Nina Arsenault, along with acclaimed artistic works as well queer performance scholar J. as showcase some of her new RADICALLY Paul Halferty (University of Toron- performance projects. to) will discuss the development GAY of Arsenault’s bodily and perfor- mance aesthetics in the Canadian Oct 26, 7pm–9pm ↙ queer performance landscape. CUNY Graduate Center ↙

THE LIFE & Arsenault will perform excerpts Segal Theatre .

VISIONARY 11/13 7PM–9PM LEGACY OF CHARLES BUSCH WITH JAMES WILSON PERFORMING QUE(E)RIES SERIES PART II HARRY HAY Charles Busch, renowned New York performer, playwright, di- Harry Hay was born in England identities. The conference will rector, and drag extraordinaire, on the day the Titanic sank. Hay feature presentations from discusses his astonishing ca- became an active trade union- scholars, activists and artists reer in the theatre and on film, ist and learned the organizing all exploring the evolution of as well as the changes he has skills he later used to advo- LGBT life in the 60+ years since seen in LGBTQ performance cate for gay rights. In honor of Hay and a small cohort of Cali- over the last four decades. Nov 13, 7pm–9pm ↙ the 100th anniversary of Harry fornians founded the Matta- Moderated by CLAGS’ Execu- CUNY Graduate Center ↙ Hay’s birth, CLAGS and the chine Society. tive Director, James Wilson. Segal Theatre \ Harry Hay Centennial Commit- This event requires registra- tee will sponsor a four day con- tion. Please visit the conference ference exploring Hay’s life and website for more information: 12/5 ANNUAL KESSLER LECTURE ideas and the multiple facets of http://web.gc.cuny.edu/clags/ 10/11 BOOK LAUNCH LGBT life that Harry Hay him- pages/conferences/hay.php. MARTIN DUBERMAN self pioneered. BORN THIS WAY These aspects will be or- Sep 27–Sep 30 ↙ REAL STORIES OF THE RECIPIENT OF 2012 ganized around four major CUNY Graduate Center, NYU, ↙ GROWING UP GAY themes: the arts, political ac- and The LGBT Center . tivism, spirituality and sexual Schedule available on website ↙ Based on the popular blog of the KESSLER AWARD same name, Paul Vitagliano’s Born This Way is a celebration The prestigious Kessler Award include a lecture given by Dr. FALL 2012 of gay coming-of-age, featuring is an annual lectureship given Duberman, as well as key- SEMINARS IN THE CITY childhood photographs accom- to a scholar who has produced notes given by several distin- QUEERING THE FRAME panied by the personal stories of a substantive body of work guished guest speakers. those who grew up LGBTQ. The that has had a significant in- TRANSGRESSIVE PERFORMANCE & THE book features contributors from fluence on the field of GLBTQ POSSIBILITY OF FREEDOM around the world, dating from Studies. The 2012 awardee the 1940s to today. is prominent historian, play- The event will include an in- Transgressive art shocks, titil- will convene to discuss the read- wright, Professor Emeritus, FALL 2012 terview with author Paul V. and Dec 5, 6pm–9pm ↙ lates, enlightens and, perhaps ings and then visit spaces such readings from some of the book’s and CLAGS’ founder, Dr. Mar- CUNY Graduate Center ↙

most importantly, provides a as the MOMA, New Museum and many contributors, including Mi- tin Duberman. The event will Proshansky Auditorium . space of inclusion for marginal- performance spaces to engage chael Musto (Columnist, The Vil- ized or neglected communities. in site specific research. Authors lage Voice), Bill Coleman (Own- At this vital moment, the role of we will read include Coco Fusco, er, Peace Bisquit). Hosting the queered bodies in transgres- José Muñoz, Elizabeth Grosz, event is Noah Michelson, editor sive art has become increasingly Judith “Jack” Halberstam, and of Gay Voices at The Huffington threatened and equally neces- Joseph Roach. Instructor: Sujay Post. Admission is free and cop- sary. We will use the city as a Pandit, NYU. ies of the book will be available All CLAGS events are free and canvas for our research. This for purchase. course will include both seminar Oct 13, 20, 27, and Nov 2, 11am–1pm ↙ open to the public. discussions and visits to perfor- WOW Cafe Theatre, ↙ Oct 11, 6.30pm–8.30pm ↙ CUNY Graduate Center ↙ mances/interventions/art exhib- 59-61 East 4th Street, 4th Fl. .

Recital Hall . Please RSVP to [email protected] its in the New York City area. We Info available on website ↙ CLAGS EVENTS CALENDAR

365 Fifth Avenue Phone: 212-817-1955 Room 7115 Fax: 212-817-1567 New York NY 10016 Email: [email protected] CLAGS EVENTS FALL CALENDAR 2012

10/26 7PM–9PM NINA ARSENAULT WITH J. PAUL HALFERTY

9/27–9/30 PERFORMING QUE(E)RIES SERIES PART I 27 Page CLAGS CONFERENCE Trans performer, playwright, and from her repertoire of critically writer Nina Arsenault, along with acclaimed artistic works as well queer performance scholar J. as showcase some of her new RADICALLY Paul Halferty (University of Toron- performance projects. to) will discuss the development GAY of Arsenault’s bodily and perfor- mance aesthetics in the Canadian Oct 26, 7pm–9pm ↙ queer performance landscape. CUNY Graduate Center ↙

THE LIFE & Arsenault will perform excerpts Segal Theatre .

VISIONARY 11/13 7PM–9PM CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS LEGACY OF CHARLES BUSCH WITH JAMES WILSON PERFORMING QUE(E)RIES SERIES PART II HARRY HAY Charles Busch, renowned New York performer, playwright, di- Harry Hay was born in England identities. The conference will rector, and drag extraordinaire, on the day the Titanic sank. Hay feature presentations from discusses his astonishing ca- became an active trade union- scholars, activists and artists reer in the theatre and on film, ist and learned the organizing all exploring the evolution of as well as the changes he has skills he later used to advo- LGBT life in the 60+ years since seen in LGBTQ performance cate for gay rights. In honor of Hay and a small cohort of Cali- over the last four decades. Nov 13, 7pm–9pm ↙ the 100th anniversary of Harry fornians founded the Matta- Moderated by CLAGS’ Execu- CUNY Graduate Center ↙ Hay’s birth, CLAGS and the chine Society. tive Director, James Wilson. Segal Theatre \ Harry Hay Centennial Commit- This event requires registra- tee will sponsor a four day con- tion. Please visit the conference ference exploring Hay’s life and website for more information: 12/5 ANNUAL KESSLER LECTURE ideas and the multiple facets of http://web.gc.cuny.edu/clags/ 10/11 BOOK LAUNCH LGBT life that Harry Hay him- pages/conferences/hay.php. MARTIN DUBERMAN self pioneered. BORN THIS WAY These aspects will be or- Sep 27–Sep 30 ↙ REAL STORIES OF THE RECIPIENT OF 2012 ganized around four major CUNY Graduate Center, NYU, ↙

GROWING UP GAY themes: the arts, political ac- and The LGBT Center . tivism, spirituality and sexual Schedule available on website ↙ Based on the popular blog of the KESSLER AWARD same name, Paul Vitagliano’s Born This Way is a celebration The prestigious Kessler Award include a lecture given by Dr. is an annual lectureship given Duberman, as well as key- FALL 2012 of gay coming-of-age, featuring Coming Up SEMINARS IN THE CITY childhood photographs accom- to a scholar who has produced notes given by several distin- QUEERING THE FRAME panied by the personal stories of a substantive body of work guished guest speakers. those who grew up LGBTQ. The that has had a significant in- TRANSGRESSIVE PERFORMANCE & THE book features contributors from fluence on the field of GLBTQ POSSIBILITY OF FREEDOM around the world, dating from Studies. The 2012 awardee the 1940s to today. is prominent historian, play- The event will include an in- In Review Transgressive art shocks, titil- will convene to discuss the read- terview with author Paul V. and wright, Professor Emeritus, Dec 5, 6pm–9pm ↙ lates, enlightens and, perhaps ings and then visit spaces such readings from some of the book’s and CLAGS’ founder, Dr. Mar- CUNY Graduate Center ↙ most importantly, provides a as the MOMA, New Museum and many contributors, including Mi- tin Duberman. The event will Proshansky Auditorium . space of inclusion for marginal- performance spaces to engage chael Musto (Columnist, The Vil- ized or neglected communities. in site specific research. Authors lage Voice), Bill Coleman (Own- At this vital moment, the role of we will read include Coco Fusco, er, Peace Bisquit). Hosting the queered bodies in transgres- José Muñoz, Elizabeth Grosz, event is Noah Michelson, editor sive art has become increasingly Judith “Jack” Halberstam, and of Gay Voices at The Huffington threatened and equally neces- Joseph Roach. Instructor: Sujay Post. Admission is free and cop- sary. We will use the city as a Pandit, NYU. ies of the book will be available All CLAGS events are free and canvas for our research. This for purchase. course will include both seminar Oct 13, 20, 27, and Nov 2, 11am–1pm ↙ open to the public. discussions and visits to perfor- WOW Cafe Theatre, ↙ Oct 11, 6.30pm–8.30pm ↙

CUNY Graduate Center ↙ & Recognitions Introductions mances/interventions/art exhib- 59-61 East 4th Street, 4th Fl. .

Recital Hall . Please RSVP to [email protected] its in the New York City area. We Info available on website ↙

365 Fifth Avenue Phone: 212-817-1955 Room 7115 Fax: 212-817-1567 New York NY 10016 Email: [email protected] BORN THIS WAY Q&A WITH PAUL VITAGLIANO

On October 11th, National Coming Out Day, CLAGS will host a these amazing photos and stories about growing up gay. (By the way, Book Launch for Paul Vitagliano’s soon-to-be-released book, that photo of Dennis is on the book’s cover!) But few of us ever talk Born This Way: Real Stories of Growing Up Gay. Based on the about our childhood, even with close friends. The Born This Way blog popular blog of the same name, Born This Way is a celebra- is a forum where people can feel welcome—and, in some cases, safe tion of gay coming-of-age, featuring childhood photographs enough—to share incredibly personal stories with the world. It im- accompanied by the personal stories of those who grew up mediately resonated with people, and the blog has now had over 4 LGBTQ. The book features contributors from around the world, million visitors since I launched it in 2011. dating from the 1940s to today. The event will include an in- BG What pushed you to turn the project into a book? terview with author Paul Vitagliano and readings from some PV of the book’s many contributors, including Michael Musto When six gay kids committed suicide within the span of one (Columnist, The Village Voice), Bill Coleman (Owner, Peace month, I got so sad and enraged it motivated me to do something. Bisquit), and Noah Michelson (Editor, Gay Voices, The Huffing- I launched Born This Way online, and the overwhelming reader re- ton Post). Visit www.clags.org for more information on this sponse helped me develop it into a book. event. Benjamin Gillespie, CLAGS Events Coordinator has in- BG You use a chronological style in the book, working from the late terviewed Paul Vitagliano/DJ Paul V. 1940s up to 1990. Can you tell us a little bit more about the choice of representing different generations of coming out stories? How did Benjamin Gillespie (BG) Tell me why you started the Born This you choose which contributors would be included in the book? Way project. Why or how were you inspired to create a photo essay project? How do you think it grew to be as immensely popular as it PV Growing up gay in the 1950s was very different from growing up did? gay in the ‘70s or the ‘90s. And I want people to see that. It’s also in- teresting to see some of the similarities. Even in the 1950s, the sup- Paul Vitagliano (PV) It all started with a childhood photo my port of a loving parent or a good teacher could do wonders for a child. friend Dennis posted to MySpace in 2008. I realized that we all have So for the book, I chose contributors of all generations, backgrounds, genders, and religions. There are so many great stories and photos that it was difficult to decide who’d make the cut. BG Why do you think it is important for both LGBT adults and 29 Page LGBT youth to have forums for discussion like the one you created? What is the importance of sharing queer stories and narratives publically, do you think? PV Forums like Born This Way show young gay kids that they’re not alone. LGBTQ narratives also educate the straight community, especially parents. Everyone has gay family members and friends. But much of straight society has no concept of the hatred, vio- lence, and discrimination that gay children face. 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS BG The photos in the book are so hilariously campy, but also quite touching. Is it true that it was the photos that inspired the Born This Way project? PV When the blog started, some people were under the impres- sion that they had to find the campiest, most stereotypical photo to be considered for posting, which is not true at all. It’s important to let go of our guilt about all the layers of masculine and femi- nine within the LGBTQ community. We come in every size, shape, and form, just like straight people do, and all these variations are equally real and valid. BG Many of the contributors urge young people to come out of the closet as soon as they can, stating that their own lives became much better after they had come out. Are you also of this opinion? PV Yes, 100%. But it’s easy to say that without knowing if a per- which I think is a very common occurrence. I tell part of my story in son’s circumstances make it hard, if not dangerous, to fearlessly the book’s introduction, but I wanted the project to be more about state they are gay. I advocate coming out as soon as you can, but all the contributors and less about me. only once you’re ready, secure, and safe enough to do so. BG How do you see your project relating to the “It Gets Better” project, started by Dan Savage? What about Lady Gaga’s gay an-

BG To follow up on my previous question, all of the stories in the Coming Up book share a generally positive outcome in the lives of the con- them, “Born this Way?” tributors after they came out. What about all those stories that are PV I see my project as part of a larger zeitgeist: The world is not so positive? What do you see this project doing for the youth of finally tipping in support of full equality for the LGBTQ community! today that are fighting homophobia, bullying, and shame or guilt Lady Gaga is an incredible artist and I have huge respect for her. related to their sexuality, either before or after coming out? Her message is aligned with my project’s goal, and that of the In Review PV I wanted the larger message to be: I faced the same ad- larger gay community. Gay people have talked about being “born versity you do today, and I ended up as a happy, loved, and proud this way” for decades, but only recently have we been able to cel- gay adult. I omitted particularly painful memories simply because ebrate it! Gaga sings about it with powerful conviction; I ask the I wanted this book to illuminate the positive and be appropriate people she’s singing about to tell their own story. reading material for kids as well as adults. BG What was your coming out story? Did you include it in the book? Why or why not? PV I was taunted, teased, and sometimes beat up. Once I gradu- ated and left my hometown, I blossomed and never looked back, & Recognitions Introductions

A QUEER LIBRARY COLLECTION BY SHAWN(TA) SMITH

After the receipt of a generous bequest by long-time CLAGS mem- For the Fall 2012 semester, a simple catalog subject search will ber Ivor Kraft in 2000, an Endowment was created in the name of prove that the CUNY system is a leader in LGBTQ holdings. As a poet and labor activist Edward Carpenter (1844-1929). Thanks to result of over ten years of acquisition, this Fund maximizes access this Endowment, the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies administers to texts that would likely not exist in a public library, or in most the acquisition of materials and resources on books directly relevant public universities. Students from all CUNY campuses have access to the fields of lesbian, gay, and gender studies, broadly defined, to to these invaluable resources, thereby transforming the essential be housed at the Graduate Center’s Mina Rees Library. nature of graduate and undergraduate research to include an LGBTQ For the 2011-2012 academic year, the Library instituted a large ship- framework. CLAGS is proud to contribute to a representative library, ment of hundreds of new titles including, films such as 2012 re- one that undoubtedly holds a queer library collection. lease Dyketactics: And Other Films from the 1970s by Barbara Ham- Edward Carpenter (1844 - 1929) was an influential English author, mer, to titles published by previous CLAGS Awards recipients, such social reformer, and leader in sexual freedom, enlightenment, and as 2011 publication, Invisible Families: Gay Identities, Relationships, tolerance. His socialism advocated for a homosexual imprint in con- and Motherhood among Black Women by 2009 Joan Heller–Diane versations of social change and public education. The Mina Rees Bernard Fellowship Recipient Mignon R. Moore, PhD. Included in this Library is committed to a collection that represents the mission of new shipment were 2011 and 2012 publications by well-respected the Carpenter Endowment. CUNY Faculty, including but not limited to former CLAGS Executive LGBTQ book recommendations can be emailed to the LGBT Studies Director Paisley Currah, 2012 Harry Hay Conference Presenter Da- Liaison at [email protected]. vid A. Gerstner, and CLAGS 2013 Homonationalism and Pinkwashing Conference Chair Sarah Schulman, to name a select few. Shawn(ta) Smith, MLS is an archivist at the Lesbian Herstory Archives and is the Beyond books, as LGBT scholarship expands, a queer library will LGBT Studies Liaison and Reference Librarian at the Mina Rees Library. She worked include a multiplicity of formats. Income generated by the Carpen- as Memberships Fellowships Coordinator at CLAGS and Web Administrator for three ter Endowment will be used exclusively to collect books, serials, years. She updates the LGBT Studies Subject guide and welcomes your feedback pictorials, graphics, audiovisuals of all sorts, electronic programs at [email protected]. and materials, manuscripts, archives, and objects of art as set forth by the parameters of the Fund. This includes supported databases and indexes such as user-friendly academic database, LGBT Life with Full Text, administered by EBSCO Publishing, a database con- taining hundreds of the most historically significant LGBT journals, magazines, regional newspapers, and monographs. While the Mina Rees Library consistently ensures acquisitions that are reflective of courses taught at the CUNY Graduate Center, the Carpenter collec- tion is uniquely on its way to ensuring an LGBT studies research hub for all of CUNY. SEMINAR IN THE CITY FALL 2012 31 Page CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS

Transgressive art shocks, titillates, enlightens and, perhaps research. Authors we will read include Coco Fusco, José Muñoz, most importantly, provides a space of inclusion for margin- Elizabeth Grosz, Judith “Jack” Halberstam, and Joseph Roach. alized or neglected communities. At this vital moment, the No prior experience in art history/criticism, theoretical readings, or role of queered bodies in transgressive art has become in- performance necessary. All readings will be provided. creasingly threatened and equally necessary. Seminar Dates: October 13th, 20th, 27th, and November 3rd. This Seminar in the City seeks to examine the role of so-called Location and Times: TBA. “dangerous” art and ask questions such as: Coming Up To participate: RSVP by October 1st to [email protected]. — What does it mean to be a transgressive artist? — How is transgressive art, already redefining boundaries of art- making, include racial and sexual, minoritarian bodies? ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR — Can transgression bring us into a space of queer freedom?

Sujay Pandit is a PhD candidate in Performance Studies at New York In Review New York City has a rich history of transgressive artists including: University; his work focuses on the interplay between space/place, filmmakers like Nick Zedd, Richard Kern, Paul Morrissey and John architecture, human rights and philosophy. He completed his BA in Waters, artists like Keith Haring, Adrian Piper and Andy Warhol, the Philosophy and Politics at Sarah Lawrence College and his Master’s public protests of ACT UP, to the more recent, artistic projects by in Performance Studies at New York University. He is also keenly Andres Serrano and Chris Ofili. interested in digital and new media. Outside of the academy, Sujay We will use the city as a canvas for our research. This course will has worked as a graphic designer, digital archivist/photographer include both seminar discussions and visits to performances/in- and multimedia specialist for multiple media outlets including: terventions/art exhibits in the New York City area. We will convene Scientific American Magazine, PBS’ Art:21, the NYU Afghan Digital to discuss the readings and then visit spaces such as the MoMA, Library, and various corporations. Sujay in the Memberships and Fellowships coordinator at CLAGS. New Museum and performance spaces to engage in site-specific & Recognitions Introductions

SEMINAR SERIES: PERFORMING QUE(E)RIES

CLAGS’s Performing Que(e)ries is a series that will take PART II: CHARLES BUSCH WITH JAMES WILSON place over the 2012/13 academic year and will explore LG- 11/13/2012 7–9pm Segal Theatre BTQ performance in the 21st century, particularly the ways Charles Busch, renowned New York performer, playwright, director, and in which contemporary queer performance is tied to past, drag extraordinaire, discusses his astonishing career in the theatre present, and future possibilities for queer identity explora- and on film, as well as the changes he has seen in LGBTQ performance tion, transformation, and affirmation. The series will include over the last four decades. Moderated by CLAGS Executive Director and performers, scholars, and writers of diverse backgrounds Professor of theatre, James Wilson (CUNY Graduate Center, LaGuardia and styles coming together to discuss their work in multiple Community College). formats, including roundtables, interviews, discussions, Charles Busch is the author and star of such plays as The Divine Sis- lectures, readings, and/or performances. ter, The Lady in Question, Red Scare on Sunset and Vampire Lesbians Performances and discussions will track the legacy of queer of Sodom, which ran five years and is one of the longest running plays performance and the shifting act(s) of the queer performer onstage in Off-Broadway history. His play The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife ran and off, querying the efficacy and vitality of live queer performance for 777 performances on Broadway and won Mr. Busch the Outer Circle in the age of media-based and digitized communication. Critics John Gassner Award and received a Tony nomination for Best Play. He wrote and starred in the film versions of his plays, Psycho Beach Party and Die Mommie Die, the latter of which won him the Best EVENTS Performance Award at the Sundance Film Festival. In 2003, Mr. Busch PART I: NINA ARSENAULT WITH J. PAUL HALFERTY received a special Drama Desk Award for career achievement as both 10/26/2012 7–9pm Segal Theatre performer and playwright. Mr. Busch made his directorial debut with the film A Very Serious Person, which premiered at the 2006 Tribeca Trans performer, playwright, and writer Nina Arsenault, along with Film Festival, where it won an honorable mention. He is also the sub- queer performance scholar J. Paul Halferty (University of Toronto) will ject of the documentary film The Lady in Question is Charles Busch. discuss the development of Arsenault’s bodily and performance aes- thetics in the Canadian queer perfo`rmance landscape. Arsenault will perform excerpts from her repertoire of critically acclaimed artistic works as well as showcase some of her new performance projects. Nina Arsenault is a critically acclaimed interdisciplinary artist who has worked in live performance, photography, video art, writing and popular national media to document and explore her continuing psychic and physical transformations. Nina’s gender transformation, her cosmetic metamorphosis through over sixty surgical procedures, and her personal life have been the subject of numerous national and international documentary television programs, radio interviews, and print articles.

ALL CLAGS EVENTS ARE FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. PLEASE RSVP TO: [email protected]. This page contains advertisements. Page 33 Page

Please join us for Princeton University's Inaugural Black Queer Sexuality Studies Conference october 20, 2012

e conference will feature four panels of original scholarship premise of their mutual exclusivity? How might transit between 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS across various disciplines. is one-day conference will culminate blackness and queerness open up new pathways of thought to engage with a keynote by Professor Kara Keeling of the University of thinking concerned with a host of issues ranging from agency to South Carolina. temporality to phenomenology to resistance? Are we in a post-black is conference seeks to create a public forum for dialogue on or post-queer moment, and if so, how might a reinterrogation of innovative research across disciplines and elds that interrogate both blackness and queerness reanimate supposedly deadened modes the intersections between blackness and queerness. Against an of inquiry? For more information, visit http://www.princeton.edu/~gss/events/events.html, or abjuring history, we ask: how might we understand the contact Brittney Edmonds ([email protected]) or Jennifer Jones relationship between blackness and queerness if we rst reject the ([email protected]).

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With germinal texts, new writings, and related art, Sexualities in Education: A Reader illuminates a broad scope of analysis and organization. Composed of a framing essay and nine sections edited by established and emerging scholars and Coming Up addressing critical topics for researchers and students of sexualities and educa- tion, the text provides a timely overview of sexualities considered through a vari- ety of educational lenses and theoretical frameworks. Threads woven throughout include visual, literary, and performing arts; youth perspectives; and an emphasis on justice work in education. The volume provides entry points for students and practitioners at a range of levels. Research-based articles, essays, interviews, po- In Review etry and ready-to-reproduce visual materials from the Americas, Europe, and Asia are linked to a resource section to facilitate deep learning, on-going investigation, and informed action. Perfect for classes in education, sexuality, gender studies, and social justice! To place an order or request a desk copy, contact:

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QUEER VOICES, QUEER WORLDS UPDATE FROM THE INTERNATIONAL RESOURCE NETWORK

BY RÜSTEM ERTUG ALTINAY

The first six months of 2012 was a particularly active and fruitful pe- Asia also sponsored one day of Chinese Lala Alliance’s bi-annual international riod for the International Resource Network (IRN), a global network of conference, where speakers and workshop trainers from India, the Philippines, researchers, activists, artists, and teachers sharing knowledge about Taiwan, and Hong Kong discussed about the connection between queer and diverse sexualities, hosted by the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies. feminist theory and sexuality activism. In order to encourage young scholars Our organization continued to grow with new projects and alliances, and students interested in sexuality studies in the region, IRN Asia is now serving the needs of scholars, activists, artists and students world- organizing a competition to support the work of students with the best project wide. proposals in the field. Another major project of IRN Africa was the digital sto- The Africa region of IRN launched two new projects, the Digital Library of rytelling workshops implemented in China. The workshops teach participants Africa and Voices in the Shadows. The Digital Library of Africa is a web project how to make short videos on their personal stories, capturing their oral history connected to the IRN website. The project will feature material documenting through image and sounds, with the ultimate goal of sharing the videos with a Africa’s queer history. Voices in the Shadows is a radio drama series dealing wider audience. The project also involves developing a training manual for the with issues facing gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) com- workshops to be made available to other groups. munities in Kenya, developed primarily by and for LGBTI Kenyans who still face In the meantime, the Caribbean, Latin America, and the Middle East regions institutionalized and social discrimination. IRN Africa has also co-sponsored of the IRN continued to develop their projects. IRN Caribbean launched the the International Day against Homophobia (IDAHO) events organized by the Gay publication Theorizing Homophobia in the Caribbean, an edited collection bring- and Lesbian Coalition of Kenya, and the queer e-magazine Identity Kenya. IRN ing together works which reflect on the complexities of homophobia(s) in the Africa has also prepared a new issue of Outliers, an e-journal featuring essays Caribbean to expand awareness about Caribbean LGBT lives, experiences, and written by scholars and activists whose work is focused on African sexualities. activism in the region and its diaspora. The collection is available online. IRN All issues of Outliers are available on the IRN website. Caribbean also expanded the Digital Archives of the Activist and Related Work Determined to contribute to the emergence of new queer voices in the region, in the Caribbean project. There are three established collections in this digital IRN Asia developed a variety of new projects. “In Search of Queer” is an online archive: a general one presenting a variety of relevant material from the region, digital library that will compile and introduce selected queer studies and sexu- the collection of the Gay Freedom Movement of Jamaica, and the collection of ality studies texts to China, especially those from the rest of Asia. The website the Rainbow Alliance of the Bahamas. IRN Latin America developed two new will include translated articles, resources, book reviews, original articles, issues of Sexualidades, an e-journal featuring essays in the field of sexuality special opinion columns written by sexuality studies scholars, and interactive studies in the Americas. IRN Middle East continued to expand Turkey’s Queer projects where community members can submit photos and short posts. The Lives: An Oral History Project. Implemented in collaboration with Bogazici project aims to promote the articulation of a native discourse by Chinese LGBT University’s Department of History, Turkey’s Queer Lives collects oral history activists. “On the Margins” reading group focuses on the marginalized people accounts from LGBTQ people to be published as an edited volume. IRN Middle and issues within the sexual minority communities in Asia. The group reads East’s Transnational Peer Review Network (TPRN) continued to serve the needs both classic works of queer theory and newer, creative works, mainly from the of students and researchers. TPRN is a free online network designed to provide region. IRN Asia also co-sponsored one of the first lesbian non-fiction books pro bono peer reviewing services for students, scholars and independent published in China, where implicit rules prevent such books from official researchers working in the field of Middle Eastern sexualities. The service is publication. The Lace Dictionary unearths the history of same-sex love between available in English, Arabic, Persian and Turkish. For more information, please women in China and re-tells their forgotten stories. Another publication by IRN contact R. Ertug Altinay: [email protected]. Asia is the China queer women’s activism map. This project features a map of To participate in our projects, to learn the latest news and opportunities in the queer women’s activism in China, including background and contact informa- field of sexuality studies, and to communicate with other individuals and groups tion for each organization. The map will be available in print and online. IRN that are active in the field, please visit our website: www.irnweb.org. CARIBBEAN IRN RECEIVES GRANT Page 35 Page TO CREATE SEXUALITIES COURSE

BY ROSAMOND S. KING CO-CHAIR OF THE CARIBBEAN IRN REGIONAL BOARD CLAGS Newsletter Fall 2012 Fall Newsletter CLAGS

The Caribbean Region of the International Resource Network (IRN) is ing the course material over the next several years, and because the final pleased to announce the receipt of a $20,000 grant from the International course materials will be available on the internet, this project will also Association for the Study of Sexuality, Culture, and Society (IASSCS) to strengthen the growing field of Caribbean sexuality studies both in the create and present an Advanced Sexuality Studies Short Course. The region and around the world. course will be presented during the summer of 2013 in Trinidad through The Caribbean region of the IRN was created in 2008 and connects a collaboration with the Institute for Gender and Development Studies academic and community-based researchers, artists, and activists around (IGDS) at the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine (Trinidad & the Caribbean and in the diaspora in areas related to diverse sexualities Tobago) campus. and genders. The Caribbean IRN highlights and promotes activism and The Advanced Sexuality Studies Short Course (ASSC) consists of a variety creative work, as well as different kinds of engaged scholarship which of course modules on various sexuality topics freely available through seek to question, provoke and illuminate various ways of thinking about open source technology at www.sexualitystudies.net. IASSCS developed same-sex desire and sexual minorities. the ASSC with funding from the Ford Foundation in response to a growing The IRN is an internet-based project created by the Center for Lesbian recognition of the need for graduate-level training in critical sexuality and Gay Studies (CLAGS) at the City University of New York in 2002. The studies in the global South; the project was piloted in sites including purpose of the IRN is to link researchers, activists, artists, and teachers South Africa and Vietnam. The Caribbean IRN’s course will not only com- from both academic and community bases in areas related to diverse bine the considerable expertise of faculty from the IRN board and UWI’s sexualities. It strives to be a central internet location (at www.irnweb.org) IGDS, it will also utilize webconferencing technology and web-based for people interested in approaching sexual rights and human rights from materials (including the IRN’s Theorizing Homophobias in the Caribbean the perspective of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer studies, collection and our online archive at http://www.dloc.com/icirn). This or who are interested in surveying research on particular sexual minority collaboration will encourage Caribbean students’ study of and research issues around the globe. Over many years, the IRN has received generous on sexuality and will facilitate connections among faculty in this field at

support from the Ford Foundation to build this project. Coming Up UWI and in the USA. Because the teaching faculty will commit to teach-

The Caribbean Region of the IRN

The Caribbean Region of the IRN is a resource for people and organizations whose work focuses on issues related to diverse genders and sexualities in the Caribbean. The Caribbean IRN serves as a network among In Review activists, scholars, community organizers, writers, artists, and community-based researchers, among others, inside and outside the Caribbean.

Resources and projects include: — The Caribbean IRN Digital Archive on the Digital Library of the Caribbean: dloc.com/icirn — Special Archive collections, including the Digital Archive of the Gay Freedom Movement of Jamaica: dloc.com/icirngfm — Multimedia Collection, Theorizing Homophobias in the Caribbean: caribbeanhomophobias.org — Online Networking and Resources through the IRN website, the Caribbean IRN listserv, and the Caribbean IRN Facebook Page.

For more information, visit irnweb.org, email [email protected], or join the Facebook Group Caribbean IRN & Recognitions Introductions

ABOUT CLAGS

The Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies provides a platform for intellectual leadership in addressing issues that affect Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender individuals and other sexual and gender minorities. As the first university-based LGBT research center in the United States, CLAGS nurtures cutting-edge scholarship, organizes colloquia for examin- ing and affirming LGBT lives, and fosters network-building among academics, artists, activists, policy makers, and com- munity members. CLAGS stands committed to maintaining a broad program of public events, online projects, and fellow- ships that promote reflection on queer pasts, presents, and futures. CLAGS makes its home at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

CLAGS’s efforts to promote an academy where homophobia, sexism, racism, and classism are studied and not enacted depend on the generosity of our members. The basic mem- bership rate of $40 ($20 for students or individuals with limited income) includes advanced notification of all public events and a subscription to our biannual newsletter. Mem- bers who donate $100 or more also receive free admission to all CLAGS conferences.