Month: November 2017

Queer Mosques as Place of Solace: El-Tawhid Juma Circle & Salaam Vancouver; the Politics of Queer, Muslim Space Making

Salaam- Vancouver: Space Making

There exists a select few places in Vancouver allotted and reserved for Muslim, queer folks to engage in healing and community building. Even having the ability to publically celebrate Ramadan, while speaking communally about Islamophobia and its intersections with queerphobia and anti-Blackness over Iftar was a mere fantasy for queer Muslims residing in Vancouver up to a year ago. Previously, solace was solely found within groups and centres who organized either around queer of colour issues or just Muslim, and particularly cis-gender and heterosexual issues; therefore, one had to choose between their intersecting identities as a queer Muslim, as official organizing in public spaces within an intersectional framework of queer politics and Muslim existence was not configured yet. It was not until a queer man from Vancouver got in contact with El-Farouk Khaki, a gay, African- Indian, refugee and immigration lawyer who had initiated Salaam Canada in 1991, as a “social/ support group for lesbian and gay Muslims” which held regular meetings, celebrations and get-togethers in secret locations in Toronto (Salaam Canada). Salaam Canada went on hiatus shortly after announcing their commencement due to death threats and claims of failure of intersectionality (Salaam Canada). In 2000, Salaam came back and in addition to providing space for interaction, they started to provide refugee support, host annual Peace Iftar dinners during Ramadan and hold forums on human rights and social justice within the queer/trans and Muslim communities of colour (Salaam Canada). After viewing the success Salaam had in Toronto with space-making for queer Muslims, a chapter of Salaam in Vancouver was started near the Davie street area, which is infamously known for its White and gay gentrification and its “violent remapping of lives, bodies and desires” of folks identifying as trans, Two-Sprit, queer, Indigenous, Black, people of colour, poor and sex-workers, as they were legally evicted from, and pushed to the deadly streets during the late 70s, and still continue to be forcefully relocated to what is now known as the Downtown Eastside (Manalansan, 2005, p. 141). The political implications of Salaam Vancouver, a social centre open to queer and trans Muslims of colour living within the multitude of intersectional oppression, holding Islamic events and talks about state-enforced internalized queer and Islamophobia, all function as forms of disidentifying with a gentrified zone which was created to ensure the erasure of those very discussions and people for neoliberal corporate profit (Manalansan, 2005, p. 145). White and wealthy gay men latched onto what they viewed as an opportunity to achieve full-status Whiteness by being seduced by empire to turn on other queer folks, aiding in the oppression and propelled murder of poor, Muslim, racialized, trans sex-workers (Agathangelou et al, 2008, p. 121). This was done with the establishment of the CROWE in 1980, the Concerned Residents of the West End, lead by a White gay man named Gordon Price and middle class residents and business owners, majority White, who “emphasized how the street ‘prostitutes’ on the West End ‘commandeered its streets’, accelerated ‘the process of decay’, and made the area ‘vulnerable to criminal invasion’ (Ross, 2010, p. 201). During this process of exile, “the West End had begun to cater to a ‘pink market’ of gay consumers both locals and tourists alike”, which was being constructed in order for White middle-class gay men to begin to see themselves as apart of the nation state, so they would partake in oppressive measures to aid in the gentrification of the West End (Ross, 2010, p. 203). In this manner, White gay men “achieved a measure of respectability, political and social capital, and residential entitlement […] by the early 1980s, whereas sex workers “were subjected to evermore intrusive tactics of ‘spatiality governmentality’”, in the form of fines and restrictions to the distance a sex worker or homeless person can stand from schools and residential places (Ross, 2010, p. 203). Therefore, the White gay men signed up to join in on doing the empire’s dirty work in exchange for a facade of heteronormative acceptance and inclusion (Agathangelou et al, 2008, p. 122). In light of this grotesqueness, Salaam’s Vancouver location near the Davie street area now disturbs the White, cis male and gay “minority-mainstream”, reclaiming the right to an intersectional way of being within that Whitewashed space and remolding the geopolitics of the area into a configuration that encompasses the intersection of being queer/trans and Muslim, while viewing existence as tied to other non-Muslim, exiled queers of colour (El-Tayeb, 2012, p. 80). The establishment of Salaam Vancouver not only affirms queer Muslim existence by providing a space which lets racialized queers flirt while enjoying Iftar during Ramadan and praying together, but also reconfigures bars and clubs filled with middle to upper-class Whiteness in the area by opening its doors for free to invite back the queer and trans folks of colour who were kicked out of homes and cut off from making a living (Manalansan, 2005).

Queer Mosque as Place of Solace: El-Tawhid Juma Circle: Vancouver Unity Mosque

In 2009, El-Farouk Khaki, a gay, Refugee and Immigration lawyer and man of colour raised in Vancouver founded El-Tawhid Juma Circle, which manifested within Toronto’s Unity Mosque (Juma Circle). This mosque has become a glowing sanctuary for cultural and religious Muslims of all gender identities, sexual orientations, races, linguistic groups, dis/abilities and class, in addition to all Islamic identities, including Shia, Sunni, Ismaili, Ahmadi, Jafri, Sufi identities (Mastracci, 2017). In addition to disrupting the traditional uniform crowd allowed into mosques, El-Farouk, a gay man, was the first ever Imam to lead prayer in the mosque and made it a mandate for anyone to have the ability to lead a khutbah (sermon), despite prayer traditionally being led solely by cis-gender and heterosexual Muslim men in the mainstream mosques (Mastracci, 2017). By enacting these radical openings of Mosque doors, El-Tawhid is reconfiguring notions of being Muslim both within the imperial-Western imaginary of the homophobic and patriarchal, backwards Muslim and by disidentifying with a religious space, which was never open to non-hetero and cis- male, normativity (El-Tayeb, 2012). Having queer and trans folks of colour mingle and pray while uttering Arabic script which was not written for queer and trans formulation of faith and uttering the prayers in spaces those folks have been exiled from in both non-Western homelands and on Western, stolen lands, is an act of reclamation (Pérez, 2016). Similar to how Latinx queers moving their hips in clubs, alongside one another and to songs either not written about their love or interrupted as lyrics of heteronormativity by their communities, is revolutionary space-reclamation (Pérez, 2016). However, the Vancouver branch of El-Tawhid initiated several years ago does not have a space within a Mosque, yet shares QMunity’s space for prayers which still embodies a form of disidentification with an exclusionary Islam and also functions as powerful pushback towards the hostility visible Muslim queers face in Vancouver, as a continuation of the global project of Islamophobia (Munoz, 1999). Yet, it is essential to recognize Vancouver’s inability to hold queer and trans friendly prayer within a Mosque and why that is, due to this functioning as a barrier to many Muslims as they cannot be situated within the QMunity space due to the overt visibility of queerness the organization presents (El-Tayeb, 2012). Many Muslim queer and trans folks are not even afforded the opportunity to mould into the White, queer-liberation discourse of “coming-out” and “being-out” as a form of survival, as doing so poses physical and emotional threat to their connections, their mobility through borders and their loved ones’ lives trans-nationally (El-Tayeb, 2012, p. 80). Therefore, in its attempt to juxtapose the exclusionary notion of Mosques, Vancouver’s El-Tawhid is configured, probably without say due to mosques refusing to let them in and the devious rise in property prices, into an inaccessible and limited space; the space only affords entrance and association to those whose identities are not fearfully concealed (El-Tayeb, 2012).

Works Cited

Agathangelou, Anna, M. Bassicchis and Tamara L. Spira. (2008). Intimate investments: homonormativity, global lockdown and the seductions of empire. Radical History Review, 100: 120-143.

El-Tawhid Juma Circle: Embracing an Inclusive and Compassionate Islam. (n.d.). Retrieved November 06, 2017, from http://www.jumacircle.com/

El Tayeb, Fatima. (2012). ‘Gays who cannot properly be gay’: Queer Muslims in the neoliberal European city. European Journal of Women’s Studies, 19(1): 79-95.

Manalansan, Martin. (2005). Race, violence and neoliberal spatial politics in the global city. Social Text, 84-85(3-4): 141-155.

Mastracci, D. (n.d.). What It’s Like To Pray At A Queer-Inclusive Mosque. Retrieved November 06, 2017, from https://www.buzzfeed.com/davidemastracci/toronto-lgbt-unity-mosque?utm_term=.qi5972YKm#.ds5P41ma7

Munoz, Jose Esteban. (1999). Performing disidentifications. In his Disidentifications, pp. 1-34.

Ross, B. L. (2010). Sex and (Evacuation from) the City: The Moral and Legal Regulation of Sex Workers in Vancouver’s West End, 1975—1985. Sexualities, 13(2), 197-218.

Salaam Canada: Queer Muslim Community. (n.d.). Retrieved November 06, 2017, from https://www.salaamcanada.info/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Black Lives Matter Historically and Locally

The essence of the broader Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement stems from the enduring struggle the Black community in the United States faces in response to violent systematic racism. BLM as a social movement takes inspiration from the ideologies of queer and Black activists such as those in the Civil Rights movement and the Stonewall riots. The three essential women of colour organizers of the original Black Lives Matter movement were Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi (Global BLM 2015). They organized in 2013 in response to the acquittal of Trayvon Martin’s murderer, George Zimmerman. Zimmerman fatally shot 17 year old Trayvon Martin while on neighborhood watch, after perceiving Trayvon as a threat despite evidence of him being unarmed and not threatening (Global BLM 2015). In the aftermath of the tragedy, George Zimmerman was acquitted for murder, sparking outrage against the state-permitted violence against people of colour. This devastating saga reignited the necessity of a movement that calls out the institutional racism and prejudiced police brutality Black folks experience. The continued deadly police brutality that took the lives of many, including: Tamir Rice, Tanisha Anderson, Mya Hall, Walter Scott, Sandra Bland and many other victims, encouraged the political intervention of BLM due to the systematic targeting (Global BLM 2015).

The movement grounds itself in queer of colour theory by centering conversations around the disproportionate violence that Black women and Black trans women experience. The militarized police response to the 2014 Ferguson protests, for the brutal murder of Mike Brown by police officer Darren Wilson, was a larger scale reiteration of the institutional violence to which Black communities are subject. The state-sanctioned use of tear gas and pepper spray against BLM organizers illuminates the ways in which the justice system violently treats people of colour. After this event, the organizers of BLM inspired activists to introduce chapter organizations in cities across America, and now the globe. The rising number of Black folks killed by police officers in the U.S. has, and continues to, stir communities to seek an end to state-sanctioned, racist violence. This has resulted in the proliferation of BLM chapters in most major cities across the U.S., as well as in Canada, Australia, Brazil, South Africa, the U.K. and many more (Christi, 2016). Black Lives Matter came to Vancouver in March of 2016 in order to draw attention to the violence endured by invisible Black communities in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, as well as to organize in solidarity with other chapters across North America (Vancouver BLM, 2016). The reach of the BLM movement is unlimited and global, because it addresses the problem of systematic police brutality that is faced by people of colour everywhere. In this way, the non-local BLM movement inspired local activism and organizing, in support of a community otherwise rendered invisible and subject to state violence.

In discussing the history of Vancouver’s chapter of Black Lives Matter, it is vital to mention the significance of Hogan’s Alley. Hogan’s Alley, a neighbourhood bordering Vancouver’s Chinatown and Japantown, was destroyed in 1970 as per the construction of the Georgia Viaduct. Prior to its dismantling, this neighbourhood was home to many black families, businesses, and a church. In the context of the Black Lives Matter Vancouver chapter, the history of erasure and displacement of Black bodies in Vancouver cannot be ignored. The dispossession of the Black community living in Hogan’s Alley was just one step in this erasure, along with the erasure of Black citizenship from the public conscious. While it is by no means correct, there is often the assumption that very few black people live in Vancouver or the surrounding Lower Mainland. This ideology detaches the diverse experiences of Greater Vancouver’s black population, and further, overlooks the occurrence of anti-Black police brutality, and the larger anti-Black actions existing in Vancouver. While the elimination of Hogan’s Alley is a shameful part of our history, discourse in Vancouver must recognize the continued erasure, displacement and marginalization of Black people today.

Moreover, the Vancouver chapter of Black Lives Matter takes into consideration their presence on unceded, Indigenous territory. This recognizes that the displacement of people out of Hogan’s Alley is only one narrative of Canada’s larger history of displacement of Indigenous folks, as well as marginalization of minority/migrant communities. In its formation, Black Lives Matter Vancouver addressed the historical and present violence against Indigenous and Black, specifically queer and trans, bodies enacted by the police.

In addition to addressing the connections between Vancouver’s histories of systematically oppressing and erasing Black lives, it is also necessary make connections to other organizations (which do not necessarily have ties to Vancouver) that emphasize mobilizing and organizing Black feminist activisms, such as the Combahee River Collective. It is another group of Black feminists who have been working towards defining the group itself and their interaction with other organizations and movements. Black Lives Matter has commonalities with the Combahee River Collective—in committing to work against oppressions concerning race, gender, sexuality, class, and especially how they work together to affect marginalized groups. BLM Vancouver’s statement on their chapter website specifically state that they aim to “centre the voices of Black folks as well as other folks of colour and hope to lift up those who are queer, women, trans, differently abled, poor, or otherwise marginalized” (Vancouver BLM, 2016). It is pertinent to note that, though BLM has been critiqued for its emphasis on Black lives and has been retorted with “All Lives Matter”, their statement reflects how BLM has never been about valuing only Black Lives. Rather, it is a recognition of those who have been traditionally and systematically devalued, allowing the voices that have been silenced or ignored to be heard—especially those of Black lives because this organization is founded by Black feminists. This statement includes a variety of identities that address not only race, but gender, sexuality, class, able-bodiedness, and other marginalizations, because these are intersections that co-exist rather than categories to which an individual can only belong singularly. One can contend that “all lives matter,” but this is in fact not the case, as is reflected in legislations, statistics, and other experiences that may have gone undocumented. Through law humans may be formally recognized as equal, yet groups like BLM challenge the inequalities that do indeed occur. The Combahee River Collective ends their statement by saying that they “know that [they] have a very definite revolutionary task to perform and [they] are ready for the lifetime of work and struggle before [them]” (Combahee River Collective, 1982, 281). This illustrates how the political work done by activists is part of a larger, broader process. It is a journey, it takes time, and most of all, it takes work.

 

References:

Christi, Jeyolyn. “The International Reach of Black Lives Matter.” NAOC, 2016, natoassociation.ca/the-international-reach-of-black-lives-matter/.

global, BLM 2015. blacklivesmatter.com/about/herstory/.

Combahee River Collective. (1982). The Combahee River Collective statement. In Smith, Barbara (ed.), Home girls: a Black feminist anthology, pp. 264-274.

Vancouver, BLM. “About Us.” Black Lives Matter Vancouver, 15 July 2016, blacklivesmattervancouver.com/about-us/.

Two Spirit Representation in developing xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Band’s Block F

In order to analyze a local place I looked no further than the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) people, where the University Endowment Lands (UEL) sits. On my route to campus I noticed a large plot of Pacific Spirit Park being cleared out for what seemed to be the start of construction development. This turned out to be UBC’s Block F Project, which is zone MF-1 of the endowment lands, and was proposed by the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Indian Band to provide a variety of commercial, community, residential and other land uses (PlaceSpeak). The land uses sound like they intend to pave way for economic and community opportunity for-and-by the Musqueam Indian Band. This development seems promising because it offers economic gain and a communal opportunity space for Musqueam people, but current plans bypass Two Spirit involvement.

Upon reading the information provided to the public thus far about Block F I found they had a timeline of the planning process, which began in December of 2012 and over the course of four years hosted three community consultation events with two more coming up (PlaceSpeak 2017). Among the frequently asked questions section on the public overview of the plans, the Musqueam’s goal was said to be to develop the land to provide income and revenue for the Band, in order to “become economically sustainable” (PlaceSpeak 2017). The decision to use this land was made by the Musqueam Band thus they acknowledge their participation in the capitalist system within they have been forced to assimilate. This can be seen as a form of reclaiming their land for economic and communal compensations for the Band, that were once unavailable due to colonial intervention on the unceded territories. This is an example of indigenous economic sovereignty, which is when First Nations people possess an inherent right to self-determination of political, legal, economic, social, and cultural systems (Chiefs of Ontario 2017).

Among the public UEL Block F Design Guidelines there is a comprehensive outline of the way in which the Musqueam nation will blend the traditional and the modern in the design construction. It is important to note the positive ways Block F is being designed in order to respect the unceded territory it is on. They will include 3.1 acres of park space and trails in order to preserve green space, trails, and wetlands. Despite this still being a constructed form of ‘nature,’ it offers preservation of Pacific Spirit Park, which is important to the Musqueam Band, thus upholding First Nations sovereignty (Musqueam Capital Corp. 2017). The commitment made to include green space and communal amenities offers a great opportunity to provide for-and-by indigenous spaces, but seems to lack a focus of whom the communal spaces are targeting. The Goals and Objectives section of the Guidelines says it will, “Provide Neighborhood amenities geared for UEL residents” but this doesn’t specify who makes up UEL residents or how accessible it will be to Indigenous Two- Spirit folks (PlaceSpeak Documents 2017). Two Spirit indigenous students and residents of the UEL should have a community gathering space within this site if it intends to provide amenities for the Musqueam Band as well as the broader UEL community.  The intergenerational trauma colonization caused resulted in experiences of homophobia and transphobia in indigenous communities, which often forced Two-Spirit folks to leave their communities (PHSA Trans Health 2017).

The Musqueam Band’s sovereign decision to produce Block F asserts economic self-determination, but lacks plans that offer self-determination to Two Spirit indigenous residents on UEL. If the land is going to be utilized for First Nations residents and communities it should also offer Two Spirit community involvement and representation. There is much to come for this developing block, so there is hope that through further community discussion and development more distinct amenity spaces will be defined and discussed. It is important that planning for sites such as these incorporate trans, two spirit and gender non- conforming First Nations people in order to account for many folks in the indigenous community who suffer discrimination due to the intervention of colonial gender binaries.

 

 

Works Cited

Bonar, Thane. “Musqueam & UBC.” Aboriginal Portal, aboriginal.ubc.ca/community-youth/musqueam-and-ubc/.

“Block F Upcoming Activity.” University Neighbourhoods Association, 13 June 2017, www.myuna.ca/2017/06/08/block-f-upcoming-activity/.

Chiefs of Ontario. “Understanding First Nation Sovereignty.” COO Website, 2017, www.chiefs-of-ontario.org/faq.

“Musqueam Capital Corporation.” Musqueam Capital Corporation | Musqueam, www.musqueam.bc.ca/musqueam-capital-corporation.

PlaceSpeak. “UEL Block F Project Status.” PlaceSpeak, www.placespeak.com/en/topic/508-uel-block-f-project-status/.

PHSA, Trans Health. “Two-Spirit.” Transgender Health Information Program, 2017, transhealth.phsa.ca/trans-101/two-spirit.

“‘Where There Is a Word, There’s a History’: Two-Spirited Community Organizer Harlan Pruden Comes to UBC.” The Talon, 14 Jan. 2015, thetalon.ca/where-there-is-a-word-theres-a-history-two-spirited-community-organizer-harlan-pruden-comes-to-ubc/.

An Analysis of the “5 Days For the Homeless” Fundraiser

The charity event titled “5 Days for the Homeless” is hosted at UBC by the Commerce Community Program at the Sauder School of Business, and its goal is to raise $10,000 for their chosen charity Covenant House Vancouver by staying outside as if homeless on the UBC campus. Some of their ‘conditions’ include, going without shelter, technology, basic amenities, or disposable income for five days, they must also be given any food they consume. This local charity event aims to address a wider problem of homelessness in Vancouver, but fails to address the wider non-local issues that disproportionately displace QTBIPOC folks and youth thus contributing to homelessness overall. On a broader scale in British Columbia Trans and gender non-conforming folks experience high levels of discrimination and harassment when looking for housing or accessing social services (BC Poverty Reduction 2014). Trans and queer folks of colour as well as aboriginal two-spirit persons experience even higher levels of discrimination due to the intersection of being racialized and queer (BC Poverty Reduction 2014). This event inappropriately mimics homelessness in Vancouver and the charity funds could be better utilized to aid LGBTQ2S* and QTBIPOC folks who suffer disproportionately from poverty and homelessness in BC.

The event itself has its front and center poster image of the Sauder student participants with cardboard signs strung around their neck, cups and hands held out, with faces of longing as if pretending or dressing up to be homeless (Sauder 2008). This image is unsettling as it dresses the participants up as homeless, when they are aiming to help the homeless. Mimicking tends to ‘Other’ people because it makes a character out of homelessness.

The circumstance of the ‘homeless’ experience this fundraiser aims to recreate is different to the unknown someone who is displaced and marginalized living on the streets goes through. There are intersections of oppression experienced by QTBIPOC persons who are forced to live on the street besides the physical suffering this event mimics. According to the BC Poverty Reduction fact sheet on LGBTQ issues, “29% of trans people often report being turned away when trying to access shelters, and 22% report being assaulted by residents and staff” (BC LGBQT Poverty Fact Sheet 2014).” Not to mention, one in four queer and trans youth in BC are forced out of their families’ homes due to identity-centered conflicts (BC LGBQT Poverty Fact Sheet 2014). These emotionally draining tribulations contribute to the overall suffering of being in poverty and homeless. Clean warm sleeping bags, curious peers on campus, and welcoming campus security all contribute to the ways this event cannot simulate homelessness in Vancouver. Homeless people cannot guarantee their safety or a welcoming response from the police sleeping on the streets. Under the picture is an article that continues on to describe the intention of the original “5 Days for Homelessness Campaign” as “…created by three University of Alberta business students as a way to support the disadvantaged and help change public perceptions of business students. (Sauder 2008).” This clearly defines their intention to improve public image and perception of business students on a general non-local level by hosting a charity event for the ‘disadvantaged.’

Their choice of charity, Covenant House, is the largest privately funded charity in the Americas for homeless and exploited youth as well as being a Christian affiliated organization (About Covenant House 2017). Despite toting a rainbow flag at the bottom of their webpage, Covenant House’s religious ties and separate gendered services could discourage Trans and Queer folks (Covenant House Vancouver 2017). Critics of Covenant House draw on opinions circulating among LGBTQ2S+ youth that describe the environment to be homophobic (Murphy 2005). Their split gender locations discourage gender non-conforming LGBTQ2S+ persons, and the high client to staff ratio makes it harder to protect the most vulnerable and targeted (Murphy 2005). An example of a homeless charity organization that focuses on the most marginalized among homeless youth and the root of the local problem is Rain City Housing. They offer housing specifically targeted towards Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, Queer, Two-Spirit, Plus (LGBTQ2S*) youth and is the first of its kind of program in Canada (Raincity 2017). They address that 25-40% of the homeless population in Vancouver is LGBTQ2S* when only 10% of the total Vancouver population identify as LGBTQ2S* (RainCity 2017). This highlights the way the “5 Days for the Homeless” fundraiser could better affiliate with an organization that accounts for the QTBIPOC homeless youth in Vancouver and British Columbia overall.

The Sauder hosted charity event could more effectively support the local homeless population of Vancouver by affiliating with an organization that addresses and cares for LGBTQ2S* and homeless youth of colour on a grassroots local level. The Sauder Business School should address the intentions of the event and rethink whether they are doing it for a public relations image or for the benefit of the truly most marginalized and disadvantaged in Vancouver. The Covenant House being the biggest charity in the America’s reaffirms the way the money raised could make more of an impact going to a organization that cares for those forgotten about by the big charities. This event as it stands inappropriately mimics homelessness in Vancouver and the charity funds could be better utilized to support the most overlooked local homeless population whom are LGBTQ2S* and persons of colour.

 

 

Works Cited

“About Covenant House.” About Covenant House | The Homeless Hub, 2017. homelesshub.ca/toolkit/chapter/about-covenant-house.

Covenant House. “Welcome to Our Homepage.” Covenant House Vancouver, www.covenanthousebc.org/.

Habib, Sadia. “’Othering’ in Education.” The Sociological Imagination, sociologicalimagination.org/archives/18405.

Murphy, Jarrett. “Wounded Pride.” Village Voice, www.villagevoice.com/2005/04/19/wounded-pride/.

Rain City. “LGBTQ2S* Youth Housing.” Raincity Housing, www.raincityhousing.org/what-we-do/lgbtq2s-youth-housing/.

Sauder Business School. “Sauder Students Take Part in 5 Days for the Homeless Campaign.” Suader School of Business, 2008. www.sauder.ubc.ca/News/2008/Sauder_Students_Take_Part_in_5_Days_for_the_Homeless_Campaign.

“University of British Columbia.” 5 Days for the Homeless, 5days.ca/schools/ubc/.

Orchestral Powwow highlighting Two-Spirit and Indigenous Perspectives in 2017

Cris Derksen and Orchestral Powwow was one of the artist and art forms featured at the Queer Art Festival on June 24, 2017 (The Georgia Straight, March 6, 2017). The theme of the festival “Unsettled” required the presence of Two-Spirit performers like Derksen along with the Orchestral Powwow in order to highlight the absence of Two-Spirit people and art from popular culture (The Georgia Straight, March 6, 2017). Artists like Derksen will expose the issue of historical extermination of Two-Spirit individuals and the lack of alternative Aboriginal sexuality and gender in contemporary western culture/media. In addition, they will exhibit the Two-Spirit movement and future as a part of the reclaiming of Two-Spirit identity and practice (The Georgia Straight, March 6, 2017).

Orchestral Powwow is a creation of Two-Spirit Cree cellist and composter Cris Derksen (The Georgia Straight, June 20, 2017). It is a new genre of music and includes Indigenous artists and performers. This medium is a means of collaboration, empowerment and the reclaiming of gender and identity for Aboriginals including Two-Spirit persons. The artistry is being used as a mode of agency, an expression of queer politics of belonging, a disruption of heteronormativity and the performance of disidentification
The music is the weaving together of traditional powwow beats and classical music and a style that brings Indigenous music to the centre of the European model, as well as to the contemporary western culture/media (Unreserved, 2015). Derksen comments that the music is a representation of the two worlds as much as it is a signifier of her being a Two-Spirit woman in a primarily heterosexual world (The Georgia Straight, June 20, 2017). Furthermore, the association of the traditional powwow beats and the classical music and the affiliation between a Two-Spirit woman in a heterosexual sphere creates tension. This tension speaks to the broader implications regarding how colonization and decolonization impacts Indigenous bodies. Derksen discloses that she uses her identity of mixed heritage and Two-Spirit gender and sexual orientation to create a unique form of music that expresses her agency and indigeneity. This amalgamation can be interpreted as a means of decolonization and the disruption of heteronormativity.

In addition, Derksen declares that Orchestral Powwow is the mode that will create a space for Aboriginals to be heard, seen, and valued, as well as given a leading role. Chavez (2010) affirms Derksen’s notion of queer belonging and being valued as a citizen in the nation-state. Therefore utilising powwow music and the wearing of regalias in the performances of orchestra music is a demonstration of belonging and citizenship. This is also what Munoz (1999) refers to as a performance of disidentification. Performing disidentification is a vital survival strategy for Two-Spirit and Indigenous persons because of settler colonialism. Like Julia Salgado’s art, it is used as a tool of resistance. As such, Derksen and Orchestral Powwow is a declaration that Two-Spirit and Aboriginals through the beats of their ancestors will continue to resist the borders of second-class citizenship in which they are placed. “Being identified as two-spirit often meant carrying unique responsibilities and roles within the community, knowledge keepers being one of the most important” (Georgia Straight, Mar 6, 2017). Adrian Stimson’s (Georgia Straight, March 6, 2017)) expresses the unique role of Two-Spirit individuals as knowledge keepers; while Driskill (2004) states that, they are caretakers. Derksen is a good example of a knowledge keeper and caretaker of the Aboriginal community and culture through Orchestral Powwow.
Derken and Orchestral Powwow is a reminder that Two-Spirit and Indigenous Peoples will continue to celebrate their identity on their terms while transforming the psyche of the nation.

Work Cited:

CBC Radio. Unreserved. Retrieved November 24, 2017 fromhttp://www.cbc.ca/radio/unreserved/remembering-mmiw-iceis-rain-on-two-spirited-success-and-cellist-cris-derksen-s-unique-musical-genre-1.3254088/cellist-cris-derksen-creates-new-genre-with-orchestral-powwow-1.3254566

Chavez, Karma. (2010). Border (In)securities: Normative and Differential Belonging In LGBTQ and Immigrant Rights Discourse. Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies, 7(2): 136-155.

Driskill, Qwo-Li. (2004). Stolen From Our Bodies: First Nations Two-Spirit/Queers and The Journey To A Sovereign Erotic. Studies in American Indian Literature, 16(2): 50-64

Munoz, Jose Esteban. (1999). Performing Disidentifications. In His Disidentification, pp. 1-34

The Georgia Straight. Vancouver’s Queer Arts Festival to highlight two-spirit and indigenous perspectives this year. Retrieved November 7, 2017 from https://www.straight.com/life/877746/vancouvers-queer-arts-festival-highlight-two-spirit-and-indigenous-perspectives-year

The Georgia Straight. Orchestral Powwow blends indigenous and classical forms at Queer Arts Festival. Retrieved November 24, 2017 from https://www.straight.com/arts/926716/orchestral-powwow-blends-indigenous-and-classical-forms-queer-arts-festival

Land Acknowledgement

Dear Readers,

Welcome to our website!

If you are reading this in the United States or Canada, whose lands are you on, dear reader? What are the specific names of the Native nations(s) who have historical claim to the territory on which you currently read this article? What are their histories before European invasion? What are their historical and present acts of resistance to colonial occupation? If you are like most people in the United States and Canada, you cannot answer these questions. And this disturbs me

                     -Qwo-Li Driskill in “Doubleweaving Two-Spirit Critiques” (pg. 71).

 

Before proceeding further, we would like to acknowledge that the following blog posts are situated and in some way, articulated on the unceded Coast Salish territories of specifically xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), mi ce:p kwətxwiləm (Tsleil-Wauthuthand,) and Skwxwú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish) First Nations.

 

Indigenous Lands to what is now Western British Columbia and the Northwest Coast of the United States

As students working within a colonial institution, the University of British Columbia, we reap the benefits of occupation and citizenship within the settler nation of so-called Canada daily, on and off of campus. We recognize that in discussing queer politics, it is of vital importance to recognize the colonial impositions of gender and sexuality forced onto Indigenous nations, which are foundational to the national project of Canada as a country. Heteropatriarchy and heteronormativity are key elements of the production of citizen-subjects. Neoliberal homonormativity changes the terrain by offering citizenship to certain queer subjects, as the content of this blog will illustrate. Queer settler subjects can and do enact colonial violence through their investment in the nation, with or without intention.

With this in mind, we explore on this website how queerness intersects with race, gender, socioeconomic class, diaspora and migration, religion, nationalism, and of course, decolonization. Discussions around queer politics must be grounded in the recognition that our knowledge is inherently mediated by colonial methods of knowledge production in the form of universities, and other institutions.

Going forward, we wish to consider questions such as: Is it even possible to study queer theory while not studying colonialism too? How might we make sense of the fact that the “LGBT” acronym so commonly-used in Canada was not used by Indigenous peoples? Is it even possible for there to be a transnational “LGBT” movement if the acronym is conceptualized from the experiences of colonial countries, such as the United States and Canada? How might a two-spirit or Māhū person resonate with the “LGBT” acronym?  These inquiries bridge together the importance of decolonial practices that intersect and co-construct queer and trans of colour theorizing.  

In Doubleweaving Two-Spirit Critiques: Building Alliances between Native and Queer Studies  Qwo-Li Driskill writes, “Native studies positions itself as activist scholarship that centralizes the relationship between theory and practice.” (Driskill, 2010) This struck us as a particularly valuable sentiment, and one to bear in mind as you engage with the collection of insights on this website. While these scholarly considerations are valuable, they become so only when paired with and incorporated into our everyday political practices and endeavors. It can be illuminating and affirming to research and think through these concerns, but merely considering and disseminating them is not enough. We must act in accordance with these beliefs as well. With that in mind, we hope you enjoy these entries.

 

Works Cited:

Driskill, Q. (2010). Doubleweaving Two-Spirit critiques: building alliances between Native and queer studies. GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, 16(1), 69-92. doi:10.1215/10642684-2009-013

Indigenous Lands. Adapted from Salishan Languages Map in Barbara Brotherton (ed), S’abadeb: The Gifts, Pacific Coast Salish Art and Artists. Seattle: Seattle Art Museum and University of Washington Press; 2008: xix. Retrieved from: http://www.burkemuseum.org/blog/curated/coast-salish-art  

Justice, D. H. (2010). Notes towards a theory of anomaly. GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, 16(1-2): 207-242.

Black Lives Matter Vancouver March to Protest Police Participation in Pride 2017

Black Lives Matter Vancouver (BLMV) March, called March on Pride was about the protest of numerous issues that affected QTBIPOC. However, the opposition against uniformed police participating in the Vancouver Pride Parade was central to the march (The Georgia Straight, 2017 & The Vancouver Sun, 2017). Considering the troubled history with law enforcement and queer people of color, the organization used the parade to voice its concerns. These concerns consisted of intimidation, harassment and the enactment of violence by agents of the state, particularly towards Blacks and Aboriginals.

I submit that there is also a problematic history between QTBIPOC and the white LGBT community. Even though the BLM Vancouver stressed the significance of not having uniformed police in the Pride parade, the Vancouver Pride Society allowed it (The Vancouver Sun, 2017). This scenario calls into question which personhood is valued more, whose voices are worthy of being heard and which bodies can occupy the space of belonging. In addition, the protest addresses the matter of the spatialized zones of oppression and trauma and the role of the city’s culpability. Additionally, the group voices its objection of the LGBTQ consumption at the expense of the lives of some queer people of color by blocking corporate involvement (The Georgia Straight, 2017 & The Vancouver Sun, 2017).

The march was from Yaletown to the West End on June 25, 2017. The parade route is significant since it represents a space of marginalization and psychological trauma for QTBIPOC. This continues to occur because of the white gay middle class’ performance of homonormativity in order to “belong” through the modes of the family, the state and market sanctions (Agathangelou et al 2008). This agenda is still being accomplished through their privileged status in engaging the city’s authorities in removing “unworthy” bodies such as people of color who were destitute, trans and sex workers. Although these disenfranchised individuals consider this zone their home, the city’s authorities regarded them as a threat to the city’s investments (Paola et al 2015 & Agathangelou et al 2008). Taking into account that these factors are related to social justice, human rights and poverty, the participants assembled at Emery Barnes Park at Davie and Seymour streets, which was named after the first Black male MLA in B.C. These topics were also the focus of Barnes’ personal and professional career.

The parade expressed Barnes’ philosophy by including the themes of safety and the celebration of people of colour. Therefore, it was a proclamation that reframed the Vancouver Pride Parade by making it a more inclusive event for queer, two-spirit and trans people of colour. Bearing this in mind, the organization demonstrates that there was a clear connection between Blacks and Indigenous Peoples. This was illustrated by Kamloops-based two-spirit activist and Thompson Rivers University instructor Jeffrey McNeil from Tk’emlúps te Secwepemc Nation who spoke at the protest about the overrepresentation of black and indigenous communities in jails, child apprehension and abduction cases, and profiling and death (The Georgia Straight, 2017). McNeil reinforced the group’s ideology of deposing of corporate sponsorship. This is because the embracement of capitalism by the LGBTQ community has diluted the original intent of Pride in New York City’s Stonewall riots in 1969. BLM Vancouver reiterated McNeil’s comments that Pride was about queer people of colour fighting back against raids by the police (The Georgia Straight, 2017). These protests, which were viewed through the lens of racism, was a means of coercing queer of colour individuals to confirm to normativity. In the past normativity was achieved through raids, currently one of the main instrument is racial profiling. The leaders of BLM Vancouver demonstrates Paola et al’s (2015) theory of placemaking by the utilising the march as a medium to create a space for their voices. This tactic was also a survival strategy.

The leaders of the organization are Black feminists. As such, they are representatives of the feminist of colour theories of The Combahee River Collection (1982). One of the mandate of the Collection is the establishment of a domain of value for women of colour that takes into account their race, gender, sex, and class. This is accomplished through the mode of identity politics, which states, “personal is my political”.
The Black Lives Matter Vancouver march echoes the mantra of the Black Lives Matter Movement, which is also that of Martin Luther King Jr and Nelson Mandela, which is “no one is free until we are all free”.

Work Cited:
Aagathangelou, Anna, M. Bassicchis and Tamara L. Spira. (2008). Intimate investments: homonormativity, global lockdown and the seductions of empire. Radical History Review, 100:120-143

Combahee River Collective. (1982). The Combahee River Collective Statement. In Smith, Barbara (ed.), Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthropology, pp. 264-274

Paola, Bacchetta, Fatima El-Tayeb and Jin Haritaworn. (2015). Queer of Colour Formations and Translocal Spaces in Europe. Environment and Planning D, 33(5): 769-778

The Georgia Straight. Black Lives Matter Vancouver march in West End to protest police participation in Pride 2017. Retrieved November 7, 2017 from
https://www.straight.com/life/929181/black-lives-matter-vancouver-march-west-end-protest-police-participation-pride-2017

The Vancouver Sun. Black Lives Matter holds alternate Pride march in Vancouver. Retrieved November 24, 2017 from http://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/black-lives-matter-holds-alternate-pride-march-in-vancouver

Love Intersections; Emergence through disidentification

Love Intersections describes itself as, “a blog and video project dedicated to exploring intersectionality through the lens and language of love. Calling you in instead of calling you out.”

Using multimedia including movies, poems, essays, and academic papers among other narrative forms Love Intersections shares stories with the intention’s of building communities across barriers. I was drawn in by the project of Love Intersections because my own personal activism is also motivated by a deep love. Centering connection and care in our relations is a radical stance in a world that seeks to divide and conquer through with what Agathangelou, Bassichis, and Spira (2008) call capitalism’s seductions of violence or, “the ways we become invested emotionally, libidinally, and erotically in global capitalism’s mirages of safety and inclusion (p. 122)”. Love Intersections inspires me to continue to enact my own activism from a place of love while keeping a critical eye on injustice.

I want to trace the conditions of emergence that formed Love Intersections and then speak to the ways the founders of the project, Jen Sung and David Ng, can be read as utilizing disidenfications towards the creation of Love Intersections. On the Love Intersections blog, Ng (2014) has a piece entitled “The VSB Gender Policy Debates: Discourses on Race and Solidarity” where he recounts the 2014 Vancouver School Board gender policy revisions and the subsequent disputes that arose. The updated policy required the inclusion of a single-stall, gender neutral bathroom in schools. The policy debates are also where Love Intersections as a project developed. In an interview for Talking Radical Radio (2015), Andy Holmes talks about the friction taking shape as “the polarization between the queer community, it seemed, and the other community, the opposition, the predominantly Asian, Christian moms (6:10).”

The two opposed factions of the debate were seemingly racially divided leaving Sung, Ng, and Holmes in the lurch. In Ng’s blog post he talks about the racialized cultures can be viewed as uncivilized when compared to the progressive West.”>culturalization of homophobia that was in part fostered by media representation. A queer ally even asked him “what is wrong with Chinese people that they are so ignorant?” I find Ng’s incisive critique of European colonization and its spread of Christianization to be especially salient here. The sedimented layers of colonialism and racialization that inform one another are obscured in the process of culturalizing homophobia. Ng asks “why is it that when white Christians are homophobic and transphobic, they are ‘homophobic and transphobic Christians’, …when Chinese Christians are homophobic and transphobic, they are ‘Ethnic Chinese’ Christians who are homophobic and transphobic?” We can see Ng’s commitment to intersectionality in his assertion of settler complicity even in the face of racialization. Racialized migrants in settler nation states like Canada are still settlers, and as long as they have an investment in the nation, whether through citizenship, rights and legal discourse, and/or economic interests they contribute to the ongoing dispossession of Indigenous people.

I posit that Sung and Ng utilized what Roderick Ferguson calls disidentifications towards both their predominantly white queer allies and the primarily Christian Chinese parents as well. For Ferguson (2004), to disidentify is to “use the code of the majority as raw material for representing a disempowered politics of positionality that has been rendered unthinkable by the dominant culture (p. 4).” By disidentifying with the largely white queer majority who in the heat of conflict espoused anti-Chinese racism and through citing their own selves as queer and Chinese, Sung, Ng, and Holmes dissolve the hermetic constructions of race and sexuality that were circulating in these debates. The assertion of queer and trans POC existence worked to unravel the myths of queer whiteness and Chinese heteronormativity while disidentifying with homophobia within the Chinese community. Ultimately, through utilizing QTBIPOC critique Sung and Ng were able to open up dialogues pertaining to racism in queer communities which they achieved through an attentiveness to love. Through attending to the deep love held by both groups of parents in these debates Sung and Ng created a space for discussion and collective growth which I think all folks doing social justice work can and should take to heart.

REFERENCES:

Agathangelou, Anna, M. Bassicchis and Tamara L. Spira. (2008). Intimate investments: homonormativity, global lockdown and the seductions of empire. Radical History Review, 100: 120-143.

Ferguson, Roderick. (2004). Introduction. In his Aberrations in Black: toward a queer of colour critique, pp. 1-20.

Neigh, Scott. (2015). Love Intersections: Storytelling, queerness, intersectionality, solidarity, and love. Rabble, February 4. http://rabble.ca/podcasts/shows/talking-radical-radio/2015/02/love-intersections-storytelling-queerness-intersectiona

Ng, David. (2014). The VSB Gender Policy Debates: Discourses on Race and Solidarity. Love Intersections, June 14. https://loveintersections.com/2014/06/11/the-vsb-gender-policy-debates-discourses-on-race-and-solidarity/

Mapping the local: QTBIPOC Space as Medicine

Killjoy is an organization that organizes events specifically for black / indigenous / mixed race / people of colour who are also queer / trans / two-spirit / intersex. Killjoy has held numerous QTBIPOC dance parties and on August 8th, 2016 Killjoy organized a week long series of events called Killjoy Fest which “both celebrates difference as well as empowers the queer community to actively address the harm perpetuated by racism & colonization (Killjoy n.d.).” Events during the week invited “BIPOC”, “QTBIPOC”, and “Everyone” to attend, depending on the event in question. These appellations were a deliberate move to create QTBIPOC only spaces where members of the community could meet one another and build connections. As Marlon Bailey (2014) writes, “space is as much a social entity as it is a material one (p. 494)”. Killjoy offers a model of “for us, by us” organizing that is attentive to the value of intentionally creating QTBIPOC spaces and places.

QTBIPOC occupy identities that are multiply marginalized in what Gopinath (2005) calls “spaces of impossibility (p. 18)”. While Gopinath is talking specifically about the impossibility of nonheterosexual South Asian women, I find her term to be valuable to QTBIPOC as a whole because of the historic entanglements of queerness and whiteness as well as heteronormativity and racialization. Because of the ways in which racialized people are othered in white settler colonial states, the desire for belonging to the space of the nation state may manifest in the performance of respectability (Jafri 2013). By performing heterosexuality and binary gender rigorously the racialized other avoids further marginalization in the forms of sexual and gender deviancy. The specific creation of QTBIPOC space works to undo the impossible notion of QTBIPOC existence. We exist. Finding one another and sharing joy and crafting relationships is an act of tremendous healing.

One aspect of Killjoy’s organizing that I love is their explicit welcoming to trans/non-binary/two-spirit/third-gender people; an acknowledgement of genders that exist beyond the binary and that they are an essential part of the community Killjoy seeks to grow. With the rise of Jordan Peterson’s infamous disavowal of non-binary genders under the banner of “free speech” coinciding with the essentialist discourse of radical feminists, transphobia abounds.

Following the transphobic, anti-sex work ideologies espoused by groups within Vancouver including the Vancouver Women’s Library (Flegg 2017), Killjoy added it’s name among scores of others in a note titled “Open letter against transmisogyny and anti-sex work rhetoric in Vancouver.” They address performative inclusion, a tactic that is utilized by groups in order to avoid criticism and obscure lurking transphobia. Part of the letter reads: “We denounce hypocritical and opportunistic uses of the term inclusivity. Genuinely inclusive initiatives must demonstrate accountability and actively give power back to marginalized people. We will not be misled by fraudulent claims while transmisogyny and sex worker phobia proliferate unchecked (2017).” What Killjoy is doing runs along the vein of Bailey’s (2014) discussion of geographies of exclusion that necessitate QTBIPOC to form their own spaces of “inclusion, affirmation, and celebration (p. 494).” Creating space for non-white beyond-binary genders is a radical statement of love and care in a hostile world.

REFERENCES:

Bailey, Marlon. (2014). Engendering space: ballroom culture and the spatial practice of

possibility in Detroit. Gender, Place and Culture, 21(4): 489-507.

Flegg, Erin. (2017). New Space, Old Politics. Maisonneuve. October 10. https://maisonneuve.org/article/2017/10/10/new-space-old-politics/

Gopinath, Gayatri. (2005). Impossible desires. In Impossible desires, 1-28

Killjoy. (2016). About us. http://killjoyfest.tumblr.com/about

Open letter against transmisogyny and anti-sex work rhetoric in Vancouver. (2017). The Talon. http://thetalon.ca/open-letter-against-transmisogyny-and-anti-sex-work-rhetoric-in-vancouver/

Vancouver Native Cultural Society Two-Spirit: WagonBurners Two-Spirit Convention

The WagonBurners Two-SpiritConvention is annual holiday dinner and show organized by the Greater Vancouver Native Cultural Society (GVNCS). The 2017 convention, titled “Winter Masquerade,” is scheduled for December 17, at the Penthouse on Seymour Street in Vancouver (GVNCS Two-Spirit, 2017; follow this link to RSVP: https://www.facebook.com/events/126504628059982/).

The GVNCS Two-Spirit society was established 40 years ago to accept and represent people who identify as Two-Spirit (Takeuchi, 2016). One result of American and Canadian colonialism was the denunciation of the Two-Spirit identity, as well as the establishment of the binary gender system (Walters, Evans-Campbell, Simoni, Ronquillo, & Bhuyan, 2006). This binary gender system exists today due to the Western emphasis on gender differences based on biology (Blackwood, 1997).

For Chief Al Houston (Silver Coyote), the WagonBurners Two-Spirit Convention is “more or less an Aboriginal Two-Spirit society taking care of [their] own community, which is important because [they] feel they aren’t getting that attention from the community at large” (quoted in Lewis, 2013). Indeed, in 2004, 38% of Two-Spirit youth sampled in British Columbia aged 24 and younger stated that they do not feel accepted in their community (Urban Native Youth Association, 2004). Given the historical responsibility of Two-Spirit people to serve their community as caregivers (Miranda, 2010; Walters et al., 2006), the fact that such a high percentage of Two-Spirit youth do not feel accepted by their communities can result in a high degree of anxiety and life dissatisfaction. Furthermore, Two-Spirit people can experience dysphoria and displacement from their cultures as a result of being forced into, or forced to choose, between one of only two genders in the binary gender system that exists in colonized Canada (Miranda, 2010).

Two-Spirited people’s desire to belong in their Native communities might, to some Queer theorists, be a process of homonormativity. However, the Two-Spirit identity has more to do with gender than sexuality, and Two-Spirit people yearning to be integrated members of their Native community, as they traditionally are, is actually an opposition of assimilation, not an adoption of homonormativity (Driskill, 2010).

Thus, Driskill (2010) calls for the intertwining of Native studies and Queer studies: A union that works beyond intersectionality and ventures into a stronger analysis, called Two-Spirit critiques. Unlike current Queer studies that un-see Native people, or mention them along with all other people of colour, Two-Spirit critiques are embedded in Native historic and political dimensions. Also, these critiques “are created and maintained through the activist and artistic resistance of Two-Spirit people” (Driskill, 2010, p. 81), such as the work done by the GVNCS Two-Spirit organization and the WagonBurners events. These activisms work to repair the relationship Two-Spirit people have with their Native communities, and Two-Spirit critiques can gain vast knowledge from the work done by these activist organizations.

 

References

Agathangelou, A. M., Bassichis, M. D., & Spira, T. L. (2008). Intimate investments: Homonormativity, global lockdown, and the seductions of empire. Radical History Review, 100, 120-43.

Anguksuar/Richard LaFortune. (1997). A postcolonial colonial perspective on western [mis]conceptions of the cosmos and the restoration of Indigenous taxonomies. Two-Spirit people: Native American gender identity, sexuality, and spirituality. S. Jacobs, W. Thomas, & S. Lang (Eds.). Chicago: University of Illinois Press.

Blackwood, E. (1997). Native American genders and sexualities: Beyond anthropological models and misrepresentations. Two-Spirit people: Native American gender identity, sexuality, and spirituality. S. Jacobs, W. Thomas, & S. Lang (Eds.) Chicago: University of Illinois Press.

Davidson, M. R. (2012). A Nurse’s Guide to Women’s Mental Health. New York: Springer Publishing Company.

Driskill, Q-L. (2010). Doubleweaving Two-Spirit critiques: Building alliances between Native and Queer studies. GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, 16(1-2), 69-92.

Duggan, L. (2002). The new homonormativity: The sexuality politics of neoliberalism. Materializing democracy: Toward a revitalized cultural politics. R. Castronovo & D. Nelson (Eds.). Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

GVNCS Two-Spirit. (2017). In Facebook. Retrieved November 5, 2017 from https://www.facebook.com/events/126504628059982/

Lewis, S. (2013, Dec 10). Annual Two-Spirit dinner provides a sense of family, Chief says. Xtra. Retrieved November 5, 2017, from https://www.dailyxtra.com/annual-two-spirit-dinner-provides-a-sense-of-family-chief-says-56319

Miranda, D. (2010). Extermination of the Joyas: Gendercide in Spanish California. GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, 16(1-2), 153-84.

Takeuchi, C. (2016, July 28). From South Asian to Jewish Canadians: Metro Vancouver’s LGBT cultural organizations and groups. Straight. Retrieved November 5, 2017, from https://www.straight.com/life/745416/south-asian-jewish-canadians-metro-vancouvers-lgbt-cultural-organizations-and-groups

Urban Native Youth Association. (2004). Two-Spirit youth speak out! Analysis of the needs assessment tool. Retrieved November 5, 2017, from http://www.unya.bc.ca/downloads/glbtq-twospirit-final-report.pdf

Walters, K. L., Evans-Campbell, T., Simoni, J. M., Ronquillo, T., & Bhuyan, R. (2006). “My spirit in my heart”: Identity experiences and challenges among American Indian Two-Spirit women. Journal of Lesbian Studies, 10(1-2), 125-49.

 

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