Spring 2010
Screening of
Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin
Februrary 2, 2010 | 6:00 PM | Hodges Library 213
Documentary Website | Film Description | Books and Articles
Lectures by John D'Emilio
Lost Prophet: The Life and Times of Bayard Rustin
February 24, 2010 | 7:00 PM | University Center, Crest Room
Dr. John D'Emilio will discuss Bayard Rustin who is best known as the masterful organizer of the historic 1963 March on Washington. But he was a fierce activist for racial justice, world peace, and economic democracy for over a generation, arrested more than two dozen times and jailed on a number of occasions. What role did he play in the peace and freedom movements from the 1930s through the 1970s? What can his life teach us about strategies for achieving social and economic justice and political change? And why don't most Americans know so little about him?
Leaping and Creeping: How Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender People Have Fought to Achieve Equality
February 25, 2010 | 5:00 PM | Black Cultural Center
Since 1950, when a gay movement was launched in the United States, GLBT folks have engaged in a wide range of campaigns, addressed a broad set of issues, and adopted various strategies and tactics. Sixty years after this movement started, much has changed, and much remains to be done. What can history tell us about which strategies and tactics work and which don't, and which issues have moved forward, and which haven't?
Classroom Talks with John D'Emilio
Dr. D'Emilio is available on Thursday, February 25, 2010 for classroom discussions. Please send an e-mail to lgbtcom@utk.edu with a proposed topic of discussion, the course title, and meeting time & location. Requests will be filled as scheduling permits.
Essay and Short Video Contest
Deadline: March 31, 2010, 11:59 PM
Submission Guidelines
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The contest is open to all undergraduate and graduate students.
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Students can submit personal essays or research papers (including papers written for classes). Short videos may also be submitted.
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Submissions should be based on themes discussed in Dr. D'Emilio's lectures. Submissions that explore connections between LGBT experiences and issues of race, gender, class, ethnicity, religion, and/or ability are especially encouraged.
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Essays may be any length up to 10 pages (typed, double-spaced) and videos may be up to 10 minutes.
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Students must get consent of anyone appearing in videos and must have permission to use any copy-righted files or must have determined their use to be considered fair use under the U.S. Copyright Law. Students are encouraged to use content licensed for re-use under Creative Commons or content that is in the Public Domain. (Additional Resources: WikiMedia Commons, NARA, Internet Archive, WGBH Sandbox, Public Domain Music, Open Source Audio.
Essay Submission Procedure
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Essay submissions should be sent electronically as a Word or PDF document to lgbtcom@utk.edu with the subject line “Essay Contest Submission.”
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In the body of the email message include: the author’s name, email address, and title of submission.
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Authors’ names should not appear anywhere in the body of the essay.
Video Submission Procedure
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Video submissions should be on DVD. To schedule a time to submit your DVD, e-mail lgbtcom@utk.edu.
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Videos should not include students' names.
Selection Process
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Submissions will be judged by a panel in terms of relevance to the topic and quality and originality.
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Essays/Videos will be coded when submitted and will be reviewed anonymously.
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First Place will be a $100 UT Bookstore gift certificate. Two runners-up will be awarded a $25 UT Bookstore gift certificate.
About D'Emilio
CV | Video Interviews | Website
Books:
Sexual Politics, Sexual Communities
Intimate Matters: A History of Sexuality in America
Lost Prophet: The Life and Times of Bayard Rustin
Creating Change: Sexuality, Public Policty and Civil Rights
Making Trouble: Essays on Gay History, Politics, and the University
The World Turned: Essays on Gay History, Politics, and Culture
Fall 2009 Events
Out from Appalachia: Story Telling with Dorothy Allison
November 13, 2009
10:00 am
Black Cultural Center
Dorothy Allison grew up in Greenville, South Carolina, the first child of a fifteen-year-old unwed mother who worked as a waitress.
Now living in Northern California with her partner Alix and her teenage son, Wolf Michael, she describes herself as a feminist,
a working class story teller, a Southern expatriate, a sometime poet and a happily born-again Californian.
Awarded the 2007 Robert Penn Warren Award for Fiction, Allison is a member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers.
The first member of her family to graduate from high school, Allison attended Florida Presbyterian college on a National Merit Scholarship and
studied anthropology at the New School for Social Research.
An award winning editor for Quest, Conditions, and Outlook—early feminist and Lesbian & Gay journals, Allison's chapbook of poetry,
The Women Who Hate Me, was published with Long Haul Press in 1983. Her short story collection, Trash (1988) was published by Firebrand Books.
Trash won two Lambda Literary Awards and the American Library Association Prize for Lesbian and Gay Writing.
Allison says that the early Feminist movement changed her life. "It was like opening your eyes under water. It hurt, but suddenly everything that had
been dark and mysterious became visible and open to change." However, she admits, she would never have begun to publish her stories
" if she hadn't gotten over her prejudices, and started talking to her mother and sisters again."
Allison received mainstream recognition with her novel Bastard Out of Carolina, (1992) a finalist for the 1992 National Book Award.
The novel won the Ferro Grumley prize, an ALA Award for Lesbian and Gay Writing, became a best seller, and an award-winning movie.
It has been translated into more than a dozen languages.
Cavedweller (1998) became a national bestseller, NY Times Notable book of the year, finalist for the Lillian Smith prize, and an ALA prize winner.
Adapted for the stage by Kate Moira Ryan, the play was directed by Michael Greif, and featured music by Hedwig composer, Stephen Trask.
In 2003, Lisa Cholendenko directed a movie version featuring Krya Sedwick.
The expanded edition of Trash (2002) included the prize winning short story, "Compassion" selected for both Best American Short Stories 2003 and
Best New Stories from the South 2003.
Dorothy Allison was Emory University Center for Humanistic Inquiry’s Distinguished Visiting Professor, Spring, 2008.
In 2007, she was Famosa in residence at Macondo in San Antonio, Texas. 2006, she was writer in residence at Columbia College in Chicago.
Fall 2009, Dorothy Allison will be The McGee Professor and writer in residence at Davidson College, in North Carolina.
A novel, She Who, Is forthcoming.
Fall 2009 Documentary Series:
Religion, Faith, and Spirituality and the LGBT Community
Saint of 9/11
September 10, 2009
6:30-8:00
Hodges Library 213
Saint of 9/11 presents the turbulent, restless, spiritual and remarkable journey of Father Mychal Judge. Compassionate champion of the needy and forgotten, a beloved Fire Department Chaplain, rousing Irish-American balladeer and iconoclast, Father Judge was a humble parish priest who wrestled with his own private demons while touching others in powerful and miraculous ways.
Throughout his career as a friar, he lived a life of witness, action and love. He provided hope, warmth, compassion, and acceptance.
For the Bible Tells Me So
September 17, 2009
6:30-8:00
Hodges Library 213
Can the love between two people ever be an abomination? Is the chasm separating gays and lesbians and Christianity too wide to cross? Is the Bible an excuse to hate?
Through the experiences of five very normal, very Christian, very American families -- including those of former House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt and Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson -- we discover how insightful people of faith handle the realization of having a gay child. Informed by such respected voices as Bishop Desmond Tutu, Harvard's Peter Gomes, Orthodox Rabbi Steve Greenberg and Reverend Jimmy Creech, FOR THE BIBLE TELLS ME SO offers healing, clarity and understanding to anyone caught in the crosshairs of scripture and sexual identity.
A Jihad for Love
September 24, 2009
6:30-8:00
Hodges Library 213
"A Jihad for Love" is Mr. Sharma’s debut and is the world’s first feature documentary to explore the complex global intersections between Islam and homosexuality. Parvez enters the many worlds of Islam by illuminating multiple stories as diverse as Islam itself.
In Western media, the concept of ‘jihad’ is often narrowly equated with holy war. But Jihad also has a deeper meaning, its literal Arabic being ‘struggle’ or ‘to strive in the path of God’. In this film we meet several characters engaged in their personal Jihad’s for love. The people in this film have a lot to teach us about love. Their pursuit of love has brought them into conflicts with their countries, families, and even themselves. Such is the quandary of being both homosexual and Muslim, a combination so taboo that very little about it has been documented.
Two Spirits & All God's Children
October 1, 2009
6:30-8:00
Hodges Library 213
Joey Criddle is a Two Spirit man fighting with other LGBTQ Native Americans to reclaim the place of honor that many Two Spirits once held prior to colonization. The film follows Joey as he leads parallel lives - one as a co-director of the Two Spirit Society of Denver and the other as a father attending the Mississippi wedding of his Pentecostal son. Joey's words bridge the gap between the closeted man he was in Mississippi and the Two Spirit activist he is today.
All God's Children presents a political, social, and religious analysis of sexual orientation within the context of the traditional African American values of freedom, inclusion, and the Christian ethic. Through the voices of politicians, religious leaders, academics, family members, and activists, All God's Children vividly illustrates the human toll exacted upon society by the unspoken stigmatization and alienation of lesbians and gay men.
Interwoven with music, the intricately layered stories unfold on the screen creating a tapestry with the theme of spiritual understanding. Respected religious and political leaders Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rev. James Forbes, Rev. Carol L. Murray, Congresswoman Maxine Waters, Senator Carol Moseley-Braun, Mayor Ken Reeves, and Cornel West call for spiritual reconciliation and a commitment to equal rights and social justice for all people.
In Good Conscience
October 8, 2009
6:30-8:00
Hodges Library 213
A most unlikely and very funny rebel — an American nun — finds herself at the center of a human rights storm with leaders of one of the world’s most revered institutions, the Roman Catholic Church. The film chronicles the true story of Sister Jeannine Gramick, who is defying a Vatican edict that she shut down her compassionate ministry to gay and lesbian Catholics, and silence herself permanently on the subject of homosexuality.
"I choose not to collaborate in my own oppression by restricting a basic human right," she says. "To me this is a matter of conscience."
Trembling Before G_D
October 22, 2009
6:30-8:00
Hodges Library 213
Trembling Before G-d is an unprecedented feature documentary that shatters assumptions about faith, sexuality, and religious fundamentalism. Built around intimately-told personal stories of Hasidic and Orthodox Jews who are gay or lesbian, the film portrays a group of people who face a profound dilemma - how to reconcile their passionate love of Judaism and the Divine with the drastic Biblical prohibitions that forbid homosexuality. As the film unfolds, we meet a range of complex individuals - some hidden, some out - from the world's first openly gay Orthodox rabbi to closeted, married Hasidic gays and lesbians to those abandoned by religious families to Orthodox lesbian high-school sweethearts.
Panel and Forum--
Keeping the Faith: Religion, Spirituality, and Faith in the LGBT Community
October 29, 2009
7:00-9:00
Hodges Library, Lindsay Young Auditorium
University of Illinois at Chicago
D'Emilio's Visit is
Sponsored by:
The Commission for LGBT People
The Commision for Blacks
UT Department of History
The Center for the Study of
Social Justice
more coming soon..