“But we are all queer”: Collective Struggles and the Art of Queer Community Building
What makes a family? Throughout history, queer folks have been building families of their own. Queer folks have carved out communities of support, creating the “queer family”. In this process queer folks have changed laws, defied biological ties, and blossomed together in response to a shared experience. Collective memory work is a method that allows us to examine and uplift our experiential knowledge. It is a process that allows for marginalized communities to speak for themselves and share what we know. Therefore, examining the memories of folks within queer families through collective memory work has been a perfect medium as we seek to develop further understanding of the array of queer families that exist, what attributes make a queer family, and what purposes queer family serves in our communities.
This presentation focuses on both the processes of realizing and conducting our research. We were influenced largely by Robert McRuer’s book Crip Theory, which guided how we came to work as a group, and how our project is growing and changing as we grow and learn as people. We were also inspired by our queer theory class and classmates; we all participated in the process of building a community to examine queerness in a group made up of very different people. Through this presentation we will explore queer theory versus queer lived experience, bringing art and accessibility into our learning, “falling into our gaps”, working intersectionally, and inviting our bodies to class. These themes we found in class led to our research together.