| An exploratory discussion of what may change within the academic setting when LGBTIQ subjects are introduced. From biology to mythology, from religion to marriage to art, queerness creates changes of meaning and implies that queerness itself has meaning. Does this rattle our cages? We hope so.
To paraphrase Judy Grahn’s book “Another Mother Tongue: Gay Words, Gay Worlds”: LGBTIQ cultures are far from “marginal,” being rather “intersectional,” the conduits between unlike beings. They are also central, not only within their own strong LGBTIQ cultural elements but also within society as a whole.
Judy Grahn, is the recipient of the 2009 Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Poetry, and an internationally known poet, writer, and social theorist. She has been a gay/lesbian liberationist and feminist activist since 1965, when she picketed the White House for gay rights. Judy is known for her gay/lesbian/queer cultural history, “Another Mother Tongue: Gay Words, Gay Worlds” (1984, 1991), for a new origin story based in ritual, “Blood, Bread, and Roses: How Menstruation Created the World“, (1993), and for her poetry, which includes two epic book-length poems.
She holds a Lifetime Achievement Award in Lesbian Letters and has a nonfiction award named for her. Judy won the Lambda Literary Award for her new poetry collection “love belongs to those who do the feeling” (Red Hen Press). A mixed-genre collection of her work, “The Judy Grahn Reader,” was published in 2009 by Aunt Lute Press. A new CD Judy recorded with composer/musician/singer Anne Carol Mitchell, as the band Lunarchy was recently released.
Judy teaches in the Writing, Consciousness, and Creative Inquiry Interdisciplinary Arts Program at CIIS, and is an Associate Professor in Women’s Spirituality, at The Institute of Transpersonal Psychology. |