[Commlist] CFP: Stonewall 50: The Future of Global Queer Liberation Art & Media

CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS

Stonewall 50: The Future of Global Queer Liberation Art & Media

A symposium organized in conjunction with the Toronto Queer Film Festival

November 7 – 10

Proposal deadline: Tuesday, July 23. Submit proposals here. 
<https://forms.gle/Wu8r7XWJUncrfYPR9>

Confirmed plenary speakers: Jasbir Puar, with more TBA


On Turtle Island, two key moments in 1969 are often cited as formative 
moments in the development of LGBTQ rights on the continent: the 
Stonewall Riots in New York, and the federal Criminal Code amendment in 
Canada that decriminalized certain privatized sexual acts, often 
articulated as the decriminalization of homosexuality.

Because 2019 marks the 50th anniversary of these two moments, both the 
colonial states of the United States and Canada have been enacting their 
own commemorations that aim to fold these events into larger mythologies 
of a benevolent state granting rights to a fledgling minority. The 
Canadian Government has released a commemorative coin, World Pride is 
being held in New York City this year, and across Turtle Island pride 
organizations, film festivals, and other queer institutions ran largely 
by wealthy white cis gay male settlers are toeing the party line and 
repeating the same story about 2019 marking the 50th anniversary of the 
birth of the LGBTQ rights movement in Canada and the United States.

We think this is bullshit.

Recent work by activists and scholars, particularly the Anti-69 
collective, have noted that the Criminal Code amendment did not, in 
fact, decriminalize homosexuality; instead, it made it legal to engage 
in sodomy and buggery in private, subsequently giving the state the 
political and judicial justification to crack down on these acts as they 
occurred in public. Likewise, trans sex workers like Miss Major 
continually remind us that the Stonewall Riots marked a moment when a 
group made up of largely sex workers and trans women of colour were 
tired of police raids on the bar and fought back against the state. In 
the aftermath of the 1969 Criminal Code Amendment and the Stonewall 
Riots, state violence against queers did not decline, as our governments 
would like us to believe today -- in fact, it only increased.

We think it is time that this history, its mythologizing, and its 
whitewashing, needs to be reckoned with.

In conjunction with the Toronto Queer Film Festival, we are seeking 
participants for a symposium on the theme of Stonewall 50 that aims to 
challenge the white settler mythologies of an LGBTQ rights movement and 
reassert the necessity of global queer liberation art and media 
practicesin our current political times.


As ever, TQFF’s mandate remains to decolonize queer and trans art and 
media histories and practices. This symposium seeks projects that embody 
the spirit of the legacy of the Stonewall riots against police violence 
and/or center a commitment to decolonizing queer and trans liberation 
histories, art, and media. We take the opportunity of the 50th 
anniversary of Stonewall to not only reflect on where we have been, but 
how we want to imagine queer and trans liberation art and media for the 
next 50 years.

We are interested in contributions that think creatively about 
Stonewall, about the idea of being “stonewalled” by the dominant cis 
white settler queer institutions. To evoke Sara Ahmed: has Stonewall 
stonewalled us? Has its centrality to our mythology and the whitewashing 
of its history obscured the material radical roots of the queer 
liberation movement and obscured the multiple ways queer movements have 
emerged around the globe? How can we reclaim spaces and art lost to 
homonormativity? How do we remember the legacy of Stonewall outside of 
“progress” narratives? Things look very different now than they did a 
half-century ago, but what does progress mean? Is it a straight line or 
a pendulum? If things get “better,” do they get better for everyone?


We are interested in papers, workshops, roundtables, readings, 
performances that critically engage and reckon with - through media and 
the arts - the history of Stonewall as a brick-and-mortar institution, 
as a site of origins, as an idea that structures queer cultural 
imaginaries. We are also interested in proposals that envision the 
present and futures of queer and trans resistance and liberation 
movements. Topics could include, but are not limited to:

  *

    Decolonial and anti-colonial queer liberation media & art

  *

    Queer liberation art, media, and movements in the global south

  *

    DIY arts and criticism practices

  *

    Stonewall as a business and its historical trajectory from seedy
    queer hole in the wall to verifiable tourist attraction

  *

    AIDS/HIV, especially centered around current and historical
    intersectional care strategies

  *

    Disability activism and global queer liberation

  *

    “Queering” the acronyms, troubling the presumed solidarity between
    lesbian, gay, trans, intersex, ace, queer, etc communities

  *

    Queer research creation and/or arts-based approaches to research and
    activism

  *

    Academic and cultural boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement (BDS)


While papers, roundtables, workshops, and other typical academic 
conference formats are welcomed, we especially encourage more creative 
formats including but not limited to: arts-based research, poetry, 
performances, music, readings, and artist talks. As a symposium 
organized with a film festival, we are particularly interested in 
contributions that engage in some way with queer and trans media and/or 
art practices.

As a grassroots organization embedded within our communities, the 
Toronto Queer Film Festival encourages contributions from folks across 
our community – not just academics embedded within universities, but 
also independent scholars, activists, artists, community members, and 
other people with lived experience that would provide valuable 
perspectives to discussions on global queer liberation art and media.


Everyone is welcome to apply. All participants will be paid and we will 
be offering a small travel bursary for those outside of southern Ontario.

Please submit the following information via our online form 
<https://forms.gle/Wu8r7XWJUncrfYPR9>by Tuesday, July 23

  *

    Name

  *

    Institutional Affiliation (if applicable)

  *

    Presentation format (i.e. paper, roundtable, workshop, performance, 
etc)

  *

    Presentation title

  *

    250 word abstract

  *

    Email address you can be contacted at

  *

    A brief justification for your travel bursary application (if
    applicable)

  *

    Accessibility & dietary needs


Individual papers and presentations should be no more than 20 minutes. 
Roundtables, workshops, panels, should be no more than 1 hour and 45 
minutes, including opportunity for Q&A.


Participants will be notified of their acceptance by mid-August.


ABOUT THE TORONTO QUEER FILM FESTIVAL

TQFF is organized by an ad-hoc collective of artists and arts 
professionals who came together in 2016 to launch the Toronto Queer Film 
Festival. We began this project out of an urgent need to provide screen 
space in Toronto for media by and about marginalized queer and trans people.


We have three primary mandates:

1) to exhibit queer independent and experimental film and video art;

2) to support the production of alternative queer film and video art 
through community-based arts education and professional development; and

3) to foster community engagement with the arts by welcoming all 
attendees to our accessible venues with “pay what you can” pricing for 
events, ASL interpretation, and closed captioning of all programs.


TQFF distinguishes itself from other Toronto cultural events that serve 
the LGBT community by focusing on experimental time-based media that 
challenges and expands social, political, and artistic conventions. Our 
curatorial mandate is to centre the programming of work by and about 
queer and trans people of colour, Indigenous people, and people with 
disabilities, as well as the work of local artists, low-income, DIY 
filmmakers, and emerging artists.


You can read more about the TQFF on our website: 
https://torontoqueerfilmfest.com/about/

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