revolutionary queerness in/from the global south (phd scholars colloquium)
dates: friday, may 17-19, 2024
location: massachusetts institute of technology (mit)
deadline for submission: february 16, 2024

“when i say queer shit, i don’t mean gay shit.” (over a margherita pizza and elderflower cocktails)

the goal of this two day colloquium is to bring together current doctoral students upending the conventions of queer theory by crosspollinating the radical impulses of queer of color critique with the practices of their own academic and creative fields. whether situated on the margins of middle eastern history or environmental politics, indigenous poetics or molecular biology, ethnomusicology or african studies, this colloquium seeks works and participants invested in widening the scope of queer theory beyond the euroamerican framework to address the pressing concerns of the global south. scholars are invited to consider the question: what is the role of queerness in conceptualizing and facilitating revolutionary action, material change, and collective resistance in the global south? in this context, the term global south refers to “a deterritorialized geography of capitalism’s externalities and means to account for subjugated peoples within the borders of wealthier countries,” as well as “the resistant imaginary of a transnational political subject that results from a shared experience of subjugation under contemporary global capitalism” (mahler). this definition, among others, remains porous and pliable, to be formed and reformed by each of the participating thinkers.

driven by the spirits of gloria anazaldúa, zanele muholi, qwo li driskill, leila khaled, carolina maria de jesus, elaine brown and dolores huerta, water warriors, farmworkers, fungi and whales, participants will share ongoing research, dissertation ideas and chapters, and thoughts about the present state and future of the university within which participants all work. the colloquium is led by graduate students and created for graduate students; faculty participation will be limited, as the aim is to build an interinstitutional community of upcoming scholars committed to shifting the loci of knowledge away from euroamerican ontologies. the colloquium encourages submissions from doctoral students straddling multiple disciplines, and experimental and nontraditional forms of scholarship are welcome. preference will be given to students in the earlier stages of their degree completion (i.e. those who have not yet entered the job market). please submit a 250-word proposal and brief biographical info through this google form by february 16, 2024:

any questions may be addressed to danah alfailakawi (dalfaila@mit.edu), vannessa velez (vvelez07@mit.edu), or alessandra jungs de almeida (jungsdea@mit.edu). successful applicants will be contacted on march 1, 2024 with further information.

potential topics:

• predominant whiteness and europeanness in western queer theory
• the interrelation of white supremacy, capitalism, and heteronormativity
• the heteronormativity of the settler colonial state
• the queer decolonial body and decolonial understandings of “queering”
• life, death, and grievability
• queer optimism and pessimism
• the erasure of indigenous, black, and global queer epistemologies
• the aesthetics of queer black, indigenous, and global resistance and survivance
• two-spirit epistemologies and the “sovereign erotic”
• queer practices of worldmaking

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