Queer & Trans Empowerment Month (nationally known as LGBT History Month) is celebrated every October at Northwestern University and recognizes the lesbian, bisexual, gay, transgender, and queer community. The university community host a variety of programs and events which aim to educate on LGBTQ issues and build community on campus.
Previous events have featured Janet Mock, Dark Matter, faculty film screenings, and community discussions on a variety of topics. We hope you will take part in this year's Queer & Trans Empowerment Month events.
Queer & Trans Empowerment Month 2022 Events
AIDS Diva: The Legend of Connie Norman
October 1st 3pm-5pm
Leather Archives & Museum, 6418 N Greenview Ave, Chicago, IL 60626
Join Gerber/Hart and the Leather Archives and Museum for a very special film screening and discussion of AIDS Diva: The Legend of Connie Norman. Filmmaker Dante Alencastre will be in conversation with Sarah Schulman and members of ActUpChicago after the screening of the film.
To learn more about the event and register for free tickets, click here.
Nest Highlight: Leather Archives and Muesum and Gerber/Hart Library and Archives
Paint and Pride
October 4th and 6th 11am-3pm
Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, Norris University Center
Join the GSRC as we paint to decorate the space for National Coming Out Day and you have the chance to paint something to take home! Painting supplies provided by the GSRC!
Nest Highlight: MSA's GSRC
Feminist Performance: Protests in Latin America
October 6th 3pm-5pm
Kresge 1515
Join Marcela Fuentes (Performance Studies) and Maria Ines La Greca (Visiting Scholar from National University of Tres de Febrero, Argentina) for a rhetoric and polictics of protest and social mobilization workshop.
Nest Highlight: Center for Global Culture and Communication
Center on Halset Art Opening
October 7th 6:30pm-8:30pm
3656 N Halsted Chicago, IL 60613
Join the Center on Halsted as they celebrate a new art exhibit in the space by artists Adolfo Santos, Gene Skala, Kent J. Smith, Frank Connet, and Doug Stapleton
For more details, click here.
Nest Highlight: Center on Halsted
RSL Hours in the GSRC
October 7th, 14th, 21st, 28th 11am-3pm
Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, Norris University Center
Take a break from your week by meeting with Eric Budzynski from Northwestern's Religious and Spiritual Life Office every friday in the GSRC. Chats about LGBTQIA+ faith, fun, music and more are encouraged! Drop-ins welcome!
Nest Highlight: Religious and Spiritual Life
Gender and Sexuality Studies Fall Reception
October 7th 12pm-2pm
Kresge/Crowe Courtyard
Meet faculty, staff and graduate students of the GSS program at Northwestern over refreshments!
Nest Highlight: Gender and Sexuality Studies Program
Gerbert/Hart Book Sale
October 8th 11am-3pm
Gerber/Hart Library and Archives, 6500 North Clark Street, Chicago, IL
The Gerber/Hart Fall Booksale will take place on Saturday, October 8th, from 11 AM – 3 PM!
This year, the booksale is themed – get ready for a SPINE-tingling good time and prepare for cozy season by stocking your shelves! All proceeds benefit Gerber/Hart (Pricing: Paperback: $1, Hardback: $2, Bag: $15, Box: $25, DVD: $2, Art books: separately priced starting at $5 and not included in box or bag sales)!
Find more details here.
Nest Highlight: Gerber/Hart Library and Archives
Kink Klass with Leather Redux - Flogging 101
October 9th 3pm-4:30pm
Leather Archives & Museum, 6418 N Greenview Ave, Chicago, IL 60626
Nest Highlight: Leather Archives and Muesum
Beyoncé Mass
October 9th 5pm-7pm
Cahn Auditorium
On October 9, Northwestern University will welcome the “Beyoncé Mass,” a ground breaking Christian worship service featuring Beyonce’s music that celebrates the spirituality of Black women. Created and curated by Rev. Yolanda Norton, the worship service uses the music and life of Beyoncé as a tool to cultivate an empowering conversation about Black women—their lives, bodies, andvoices—and create an experience of story, scripture, and song that calls forthe liberation of all people.
This is a free, ticketed, event. Claim tickets here.
Nest Highlight:Religious and Spiritual Life, The African American Studies Department
Womanist Talkback: A Conversation on Being and Belonging
October 10th 1:00pm-2:30pm
Alice Millar Chapel
Join the office of Religious and Spiritual Life and For Members Only for a student-moderated discussion with worship curator Rev. Yolanda Norton, and a panel of Black women from an intersection of communities, including, but not limited to: Northwestern University, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, Evanston, and the Greater Chicagoland area.
Nest Highlight: Religious & Spiritual Life and For Members Only
Gays and Gospel
October 11th 7:00pm-8:30pm
Alice Millar Chapel
“Gays and Gospel”pays homage to Black LGBTQ+ people who played an integral role in the creationof gospel music. Drawing on their personal, scholarly, and performance expertise, Dean E. Patrick Johnson and Assistant Professor of Instruction, KentR. Brooks take audiences on a journey from gospel music’s roots to thecontemporary moment, acknowledging how Black queer artists helped shape amusical genre that transformed the world.
Nest Highlight: One Book Northwestern, Religious & Spiritual Life and Northwestern School of Communication
An Evening with Andrew Solomon
October 13th 7pm-9pm
Annie May Swift Hall, Helmerich Auditorium
Andrew Solomon‘s memoir, The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression, won the National Book Award, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and was a worldwide bestseller – published in more than twenty languages. It is included in the London Times One Hundred Best Books of the Decade, and it is widely considered the definitive text on depression. Acclaimed as a revolutionary feat of journalism, Far From the Tree: Parents, Children & the Search for Identity, is an examination of the means by which families accommodate children with physical, mental and social disabilities and how these unusual situations can be invested with love.
Andrew is an outspoken activist and philanthropist for many causes in LGBT rights, mental health, family, disability issues, education and the arts. He is the founder of the Solomon Research Fellowships in LGBT Studies at Yale University and is a Professor of Clinical Psychology at Columbia University. He holds a PhD degree in Psychology from Jesus College, Cambridge and is the former President of PEN American Center. In 2021, Andrew became a lecturer at Yale Medical School.
More about Andrew at https://tuesdayagency.com/andrew-solomon/
Nest Highlight: Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities, ISGMH, Office of the Provost, OIDI, SPAN
Conversation about Abortion Rights and the Roe Reversal
October 14th 12:30pm-2:00pm
Kresge Hall 2-415
Joanna Grisinger (Legal Studies) and Kate Masur (History) will lead a conversation about the historicalcontexts of the Roe v Wadereversal; the stakes and limits of different types of Constitutional interpretation; the intents and complex afterlives of the 14th Amendment's dueprocess protections; and the different ways in which post-Dobbs state-level billsare being designed and resisted.
Nest Highlight: Gender and Sexuality Studies Program
GSRC Movie Night
October 20th 7pm-9pm
Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, Norris University Center
Join us for a casual night in the GSRC as we watch a LGBTQIA+ movie together! Movie nominations are currently being accepted!
Nest Highlight: MSA's GSRC
CARE Sexual Health Coaching Drop Ins
October 25th 1pm-3pm
Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, Norris University Center
It's no secret that K-12 sexual health education varies across the US, most of which continues to be medically inaccurate, stigmatizing, and shame filled. In our continued effort to create a culture of healthy sexuality at Northwestern where sexual violence, relationship violence, and stalking are not tolerated, CARE offers Sexual Health Consults. As stated by the CDC's Sexual Health Education, “Effective sexual health education curriculum are programs that include: Medical accuracy, culturally relevant content, and skills that target key behavioral outcomes & promote healthy sexual development,” all of which this service encompasses. Drop-in to speak with a CARE staff member about an array of topics under the vast umbrella of sexual health/wellness.
Learn more about sexual health consults here.
Nest Highlight: Center for Awareness, Response and Education
Intersex Awareness Day Tabling
October 26th 11am-3pm
Norris West Entrance Tables
Join MSA's GSRC as we share information to increase intersex awareness and pass out intersex swag!
Nest Highlight: MSA's GSRC
Transgender Athletes: A Status Report
October 28th 11:30-11:45
This evolving and critically important topic will be covered in an approximately 10-minute video in partnership with WTTW-Ch. 11 and will include transgender athletes’ personal stories, as well as the science and politics involved.
More details about this and the entire title IX series of events can be found here.
Nest Highlight: Medill School of Journalism, Media, and Integrated Marketing Communications
Legal Walk Selfie Contest
Submission by Oct 31st
North Halsted Neighborhood
Talk a walk down to the Halsted streed and tour Chicago's legacy walk. Take a selfie with your facorite person and submit your photo here by October 31st to be entered into a raffle for 3 chances at a $50 amazon giftcard.
Nest Highlight: The Legacy Project, MSA's GSRC
Campus and Community Events
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Find even more events hosted by Rainbow Alliance, QPGSA, community organizations in Chicago, and more on the LGBTQIA Google calendar updated weekly!