Directions in African Queer Studies

Directions In African Queer Studies is a two-day conference that will take place October 14 & 15, 2016. Hosted by The University of Western Ontario, and jointly sponsored by the departments and programs in the Faculty of Arts & Humanities as well as the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the event will be located at the Ivey Spencer Leadership Center. Participants at the conference will be coming from South Africa, Nigeria, the United States, the UK, and Canada.

In the last fifteen years, scholars across a range of disciplines have inaugurated the field of African queer studies. The new scholarship responds, in great part, to debates about the figures of the queer—incarnated as lesbian, gay, intersexed, transgendered, or indeterminate—which have assumed new importance in Africa and for Africanists. This rapidly expanding field is not unified: research questions, methods, objects of study, as well as theorizations of African queer sexualities diverge across disciplinary, regional, and linguistic divides. Indeed, they are further complicated by intersections with postcolonial studies, diaspora studies, gender and sexuality studies, and queer studies. Some Africanists query the pertinence of “queer” to scholarship on the various forms of sexuality and gender studies that has a long trajectory within African studies. In broad terms, such challenges to the use of “queer” or queer studies dispute the relevance of scholarship from North American and European academic circles. These challenges, however, seem to ignore how work produced on the continent is in conversation with research activities globally.

Objectives: The intention in organizing this conference is to bring together scholars who will explore the emergent field of African queer studies. It will ask researchers to evaluate the directions in the field by articulating the agendas, epistemologies, and practices at work or deployed in the field. Researchers will consider how ongoing research can inform further research on minoritan sexualities, pedagogical practices and, possibly, policy issues. In this conference, scholars will debate methodologies for African queer studies. The overall objective is to record the bodies of knowledge and outline positions and practices shaping the field. This collaborative venture will also identify scholars in the field and facilitate exchange.

CONTACT: africanqueerstudies@gmail.com