Queer Québec Colloquium
Montréal, Canada
to be held in association with
Biennial Conference of
American Council for Québec Studies (ACQS)
October 16-19, 2014
Montreal Marriott Château Champlain
In early 2013, forty years after Montreal’s Théâtre de Quat’Sous first staged the queer themes of Michel Tremblay’s ground-breaking Hosanna, Sans Tabou productions announced the creation of Coming Out, “la première websérie gay au Québec.” For their upcoming biennial conference, the American Council for Quebec Studies joins Contemporary French Civilization, Québec Studies, and Liverpool University Press in inviting scholars to examine and re-examine the place, role, use, and power of Québécois queer expressions as new media begin to take and shape them. For some decades, Québécois writers, artists, activists, performers, and film directors have imagined verbal, visual, and virtual forms to present queer differences to the world. Scholars from a variety of locales have also been investigating issues of queer identification, accommodation, and determination in Québec, often analyzing these queer specificities in terms related to Québec’s own cultural particularities and differences. Our goal at this colloquium is to bring together practitioners and scholars involved in a variety of creative and academic fields to examine these questions for this still-young twenty-first century and its changing expressions. As we examine and re-examine queer pasts and presents, we wish to explore what creative and scholarly tools give life to a future in/of a queer Québec.
Possible Themes
Queer canons/auteurs Hosanna at 40
Queer icons and heroes Queer mises en scène
Public/private identities Queer/ed political discourses and public figures
Queer communities LGBT/Queer performance and music
Queer visibility/invisibility Queer youth cultures
Queer archives LGBT/Queer textual figures
Queer national/provincial Queer indigeneity/le queer autochtone
Queer majority/minority Global gay city/City as queer memory
Queer diaspora Queer maps and flânerie
Queer immigrant expressions Queer temporalities/queer pasts and futures
Queer race and ethnic matters Queer presence or silence in popular protests
Queer/ed language/queer joual Queer/ed religious discourses
Queer in translation/studies The working queer
Queer filiation Queer/ing church
Queer revolts and revolutions Queer theory and feminism in Québec
The virtual queer The queer child
The list of themes is only a suggestion of possible topics. We look forward to proposals from artists, activists, and performers as well as scholars from a variety of fields, from history to cinema studies, from political science to literature, from geography to performance studies.
We welcome creative work, photographs, exhibitions, and scholarship on themes previously examined in Queer Québec studies as well as explorations of new directions. We also welcome work on any historical period from the late-nineteenth century to the present. Interdisciplinary approaches are strongly encouraged.
To be considered for the colloquium, please submit your individual abstract (250-300 words), in English or French, to the ACQS website (www.acqs.org) by 15 April 2014, noting “Queer Québec” under “Comments.” Your proposal will be forwarded to Dr. Charles Batson (batsonc@union.edu) and Dr. Denis M. Provencher (provench@umbc.edu), the colloquium organizers. To propose a full session, please contact Drs. Batson and Provencher directly by 1 April 2014 with your session rationale (900-1000 words), including the names, affiliations, and abstracts of all participants. Once your proposal is accepted for the colloquium, you will receive further information concerning registration, lodging, and related matters.
The colloquium organizers have plans to publish a special issue of Québec Studies on “Queer Québec” and hence are looking for a wide variety of topics for this project.
Québec Studies, Contemporary French Civilization, and Liverpool University Press are proud sponsors of this colloquium.
Comité scientifique:
Charles Batson (Union College)
Dominique Fisher (UNC – Chapel Hill)
Bénédicte Mauguière (Colby College)
Karen McPherson (University of Oregon)
Denis Provencher (University of Maryland Baltimore County)
Robert Schwartwald (Université de Montréal)