UCLA QGrad
Conference 2023
New Coalitions
Call for Papers
Queerness is where we can expand, rather than limit, the spaces of possibility for self
and collective expression and engagement with the world.
- Dr. Sa’ed Atshan, Keynote Speaker
UCLA LGBT Studies’ 26th QGrad Conference is seeking graduate student papers that speak to the theme: “New Coalitions.” We hope that this year's conference will generate rich discussions about past, present, and future solidarities between queer and other social justice movements across the world. We wish to foster intellectual and activist commitments that are intersectional, global, and anti-imperialist, and we encourage submissions from all fields of study. Possible submission topics include, but are not limited to, past, emerging, and potential connections between Queer/LGBTQIA+ theory/movements and one or more of the following:
• decolonization, anti-war, and non-violence movements.
• racial justice and prison abolition.
• economic equality and mutual aid.
• health, disability, and neurodivergence.
• reproductive rights.
• transgender and gender equality.
• climate and food security.
We also welcome submissions that consider:
• comparative modalities of activism, political engagement, and agency.
• thinking with, through, against, and beyond human rights frameworks.
• solidarities made possible or hindered by digital, transnational technologies.
• collaborations between theorists, activists, and artists.
• the affective contours of coalition building and sustaining.
• Intersections and disjunctures between humanist and posthuman discourses.
This list is by no means exhaustive, but as you consider your submission, keep in mind the overall theme of past, emerging, and potential connections across boundaries that have conventionally been kept or considered separate.
Apply here (Google Form):
https://forms.gle/
The last day to submit to the CFP is Wednesday, March 15th, at 11:59pm PST. Contributions are welcomed from all disciplines and should be in alignment with the theme. Interested students should submit 500-word abstracts along with their CV and a short 150-word bio.
This year’s conference will be held on Friday, May 19, 2023 at UCLA, a land grant institution whose formation rests upon the dispossession of the Gabrielino and Tongva/Kizh peoples, the traditional caretakers of this land, whose history and presence resonates through this event and our every day.
The conference will be held entirely in person, and this year we are happy to offer conference participants from outside of UCLA partially subsidized accommodations at the UCLA Guest House (more information about this will be shared upon acceptance to present at the conference).
Please direct questions to uclalgbtq@gmail.com
More about the Keynote
Upon his graduation from Swarthmore College, our distinguished Keynote speaker, Dr. Sa’ed Atshan, received an award the institution named that year—the Edward Said/Audre Lorde Scholar-Activist Award. The critical legacy memorialized in this honorary title aptly captures Professor Atshan’s commitments, and is evident across his work: from his efforts to work with Israelis and Germans to repair the wretched reality in Palestine/Israel; to his current research about the parallels and disjunctures between African-American and Palestinian Quakers; to his ongoing study about LGBTQ movements across North Africa and the Middle East. The UCLA LGBT Studies program shares professor Atshan’s conviction that new coalitions are the way forward.