DC Queer Studies Symposium 2023

Speaker Bios

Sponsors

Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies

Arts for All

College of Arts and Humanities

Department of African American Studies

Department of American Studies

Department of English

Department of History

School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies

Office of Diversity and Inclusion

 

RSVP information

DC Queer Studies returns October 25th for "The Queer Limit of Black Memory, Ten Years Later: A Celebration of the Scholarship of Matt Richardson." In celebration of the 10th anniversary of the publication of Dr. Richardson's book, The Queer Limit of Black Memory: Black Lesbian Literature and Irresolution.

As the first monograph to explore Black lesbian literature, The Queer Limit of Black Memory's interventions have reverberations across  lesbian studies, performance studies, social justice, issues of racial equity, and trans studies. Ten years later, we return to The Queer Limit in a political climate where queer sexuality, gender expression, and trans bodies - in bathrooms, in entertainment, in our schools - are targeted as objects of American fear and right-wing legislation.

Homophobia, transphobia, and anti-Blackness are explicitly central to Western political discourse. Now, as the US approaches the political campaign season for upcoming elections in 2024, it is time we reckon with these attacks on Black trans and queer bodies using intersectional feminist methodologies. We in the Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, and our co-sponsors in the Departments of English, History, the Program in Black Women's Studies, and in ARHU's Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, are convening, transforming, and offering space for UMD's diverse community to discuss how race, gender, and feminism matters to LGBTQ rights, people, and political elections across the country. We will consider how the queer limits articulated by Richardson a decade ago converge on this fraught moment for Blackness, transness, and the many other intersections of gender and sexuality still entering into the frame.

This is a hybrid event, but lunch will be offered to in-person participants with RSVP.

If you have any questions or need to request any accommodations, please contact us at wgss@umd.edu.