Symposium Schedule

Join us for the entire symposium or for select panels! Coffee and snacks will be served.

When? Friday, April 17, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Where? Love Library 430

11:00 a.m. - 11:15 a.m. Opening Remarks

11:15 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. Undergrad Panel

• Birdy Wilbon, "The Voice of Disability: How Still/Here by Bill T. Jones Reveals the Exclusion of Disability in Art and Intertwinement of Disability and Queer History"
• Andrea Suhyoun, "Indoor Tanning Intentions in Sexual Minority Men: The Influence of Affect Regulation, Appearance Motives, and Race/Ethnicity"
• Spencer Pilz, "Speak or Die: A Scenic Design Concept"
• Carissa Clarke, "Undead bodies: Disembodied Gender, Queerness, and Vampirism"

12:30 p.m. - 12:45 p.m. Break

12:45 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. Keynote

• Toby Beauchamp, Associate Professor, Department of Gender & Women's Studies, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, "Trans Studies for Grim Times"
  
  This talk takes as its premise that as efforts to limit trans participation in public life intensify, the terms of available discourse are increasingly constrained by the legal and legislative arenas. What strategies can best support trans people today, in the context of anti-trans political projects that are intertwined with fascist and white supremacist ideologies? I consider three prominent examples—the appeal to medical expertise, the denial of regret, and the invocation of parental rights—to explore how trans-supportive arguments can become ensnared in authoritarian frameworks that limit our collective political imaginary. This talk proposes that trans studies offers us crucial resources for defining new parameters of political discourse, for embracing the full spectrum of trans life, and for more clearly grasping and naming the realities of our current world.

2:00 p.m. - 2:15 p.m. Break

2:15 p.m. - 3:45 p.m. Grad Panel

• Jada Reed, "Coloniality of Birth"
• Jimena Mojica-Camarena, "Traversing the Borderlands"
• Lalo Rivera, "What the Desert Witnessed: a Rural Queer Borderlands Remembering"

3:45 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. Closing Remarks

Co-sponsored by LGBTQ+ Studies Program, Department of Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, and the Pride Center

For questions and accommodations, email [email protected].

 

 

 

Call for Papers

Graduate and undergraduate students are encouraged to submit work related to the 2SLGBTQIA+ community! 

Project submissions are due March 3, 2026 at 9 a.m.

Submit your work.