CLAGS: Center for LGBTQ Studies

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CLAGS: Center for LGBTQ Studies

The first university-based LGBTQIA research center in the United States.

CLAGS: Center for LGBTQ Studies provides a platform for intellectual leadership in addressing issues that affect Le***an, Gay, Bis*xual, Transgender, and Q***r individuals and other s*xual and gender minorities. As the first university-based LGBTQ research center in the United States, CLAGS nurtures cutting-edge scholarship, organizes colloquia for examining and affirming LGBTQ lives, and fosters network-building among academics, artists, activists, policy makers, and community members. CLAGS stands committed to maintaining a broad program of public events, online projects, and fellowships that promote reflection on q***r pasts, presents, and futures. CLAGS makes its home at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, 365 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10016.

09/28/2026

Yale Le***an, Gay, Bis*xual, and Transgender Studies in collaboration with CLAGS welcomes you to join us for the JAMES R. BRUDNER ’83 MEMORIAL PRIZE AND LECTURES 2026–27 honoring Catherine Opie with A.L Steiner.  Join us Friday October 30 at 5pm at the CUNY Graduate Center William P. Kelly Skylight Room ,365 5th Avenue NYC.

The Brudner Prize, established in 2000, is awarded annually to an accomplished scholar, artist, or activist whose work has made significant contributions to LGBT studies and LGBT communities. The Brudner prize winner gives a Prize Lecture at Yale and in New York City. The prize comes with an award of $10,000.

Link in bio!!

09/22/2026

CLAGS is excited to launch a new series for the 2026-2027 academic year: Q***r & Trans Politics Now!

This series explores the imbrications of past q***r struggles, catastrophic ruptures in intergenerational knowledge transmission, solidarity, spatiality, s*x, and the multiple and perpetual catastrophes of this historical moment in q***r and trans politics today. Through interactive workshops, radical q***r imagining, and anti-imperialist analysis, the events in this series intervene in the widening gap between q***r and trans theory in the academy and the movements for collective liberation, survival, and worldbuilding happening in our communities.

Speakers include Abdulhamit Arvas, Akasha Eden, Eman Abdelhadi, Emilio Martínez Poppe, Lou Cornum, Maya Mikdashi, Mario DiGangi, M.E. O’Brien, Sol Brager, and Terrance Wooten

Tomorrow, we host the first installment of this series, Living After the End of the World an interactive workshop with Akasha

This series is organized by Debarati Biswas and Kassandra Sparks

Visit our landing page for registration here https://linktr.ee/q***rtranspoliticsnow. Links also in bio

09/17/2026

Join us on October 5th 4:30pm-6:00pm EST for The Homoerotics of Empire, a Book Salon with Abdulhamit Arvas, Mario DiGangi, and Terrance Wooten.

Boys Abducted explores the history of abducted boys in English and Ottoman literary and visual culture to examine the relationships between homoeroticism, race, and empire in the early modern period. The popular literary trope of the abducted beautiful boy—often eroticized as an exotic object of desire—intersects with the historical phenomenon of vulnerable youths who were captured and exchanged within the global traffic in bodies. The book salon will be a discussion on how this past history might inform q***r politics in our present moment.

This is an online event. October 15, 2026, from 4:30pm-6:00pm EST
RSVP Here. https://bit.ly/4cT84hr. Link also in bio

09/11/2026

Join us for Making Gay History: Memoir of a Scholar-Activist: A Book Talk with John D’Emilio

Making Gay History recounts John D’Emilio’s career as a public historian, activist, and academic. Tracing his involvement in developing LGBTQ history from the 1970s to the 1990s, D’Emilio paints a q***r history both personal and national that helps us understand how the LGBTQ movement has grown.

Date:
Saturday, October 10, 2026

Time: 6-8PM

Location:
The Bureau of General Services Q***r Division
The LGBT Community Center, 208 W 13th St #210, New York, NY 10011

This event is cosponsored by the Bureau of General Services Q***r Division and Hive Mind Books.

09/10/2026

Join CLAGS: The Center for LGBTQ Studies on September 15 for the 25th Anniversary of the ACT UP
Oral History Project: A Celebration with Jim Hubbard and Sarah Schulman.

While this event is sold out for in person tickets, we welcome you to join us online!

A quarter century ago, Jim and Sarah realized that the legacy of ACT UP was fading due to the internet revolution and lack of digitized material. With the goal of creating an archive of uncensored testimony, in 2001 they began 18 years of work in collaboration with James Wentzy, in which 188 interviews were conducted. This material formed the basis of Jim’s film UNITED IN ANGER: A History of ACT UP and Sarah’s book LET THE RECORD SHOW: ACT UP, New York 1987-1993. Making all materials available for free at www.actuporalhistory.org, their website has had at least 14 million hits and over 700,000 transcripts have been downloaded. Jim and Sarah will be joined by CLAGS director Matt Brim, author of the teaching guide to UNITED IN ANGER for remembrances, analysis, gossip and reflection on how two friends created so many resources for the world.

Date and time:
September 15, 2026 6:00PM-8:00PM

Location:
Segal Theater
CUNY Graduate Center
365 Fifth Avenue, NY, NY 10016

Cosponsors:
This event is cosponsored by the Center for the Humanities, the Center for Place, Culture and Politics, the Advanced Certificate in LGBTQ Studies, and the Barnard Center for Research on Women, Mix NYC

08/31/2026

Join us Wednesday September 23rd from 6:30-8:30 for “Living After the End of the World” with Akasha Eden.

This event examines the AIDS crisis and other apocalypses experienced by minoritized communities not just as distant tragedy, but as catastrophic rupture in the system of intergenerational knowledge transmission that defines Leather culture. We lost many of the elders who held our institutional memory, our protocols, and the political dimensions of our erotic practices. This global apocalypse was structured by systemic inequality, disproportionately devastating Black and brown q***r communities and trans women of color who were often erased from the official narratives of the epidemic. Drawing on Afrofuturist and Indigenous futurist frameworks, we ask: What does it mean to imagine a future when you have already survived the end of the world?

Akasha Even, Sister of the House of Kush, full ONYX Pearl of the Northeast chapter and Vice President for 2026, as well as Northeast s-type 2024, is a polyamorous Leatherwoman, collared s-type, attorney, and author. An international presenter and advocate for LGBTQIAA+ rights, BIPOC liberation, and womanism, she leads book clubs, mentors newcomers, and educates across global kink communities. Akasha Eden is a Leatherwoman, griot, and Leather community servant whose work blends spirituality, mental health advocacy, and academic rigor. 2026 Scholar-in-Residence for Women of Drummer and the Carter Johnson Library and Collection, Vice President of ONYX Pearls NY/NE, Northeast slave 2024, and 2023 MAsT International Presenter of the Year, Akasha works tirelessly to arm the community with the power of knowledge. Rooted in Black femme resilience, she teaches & presents in hopes of helping her community discover joy, embodiment, and systems navigation in Leather, B**M & WIITWD.

Link in bio!!!

08/20/2026

Join us September 15th for the 25th Anniversary of the ACT UP Oral History Project: A Celebration with Jim Hubbard and Sarah Schulman

A quarter century ago, Jim and Sarah realized that the legacy of ACT UP was fading due to the internet revolution and lack of digitized material. With the goal of creating an archive of uncensored testimony, in 2001 they began 18 years of work in collaboration with James Wentzy, in which 188 interviews were conducted. This material formed the basis of Jim’s film UNITED IN ANGER: A History of ACT UP and Sarah’s book LET THE RECORD SHOW: ACT UP, New York 1987-1993. Making all materials available for free at www.actuporalhistory.org, their website has had at least 14 million hits and over 700,000 transcripts have been downloaded. Jim and Sarah will be joined by CLAGS director Matt Brim, author of the teaching guide to UNITED IN ANGER for remembrances, analysis, gossip and reflection on how two friends created so many resources for the world.

Date and time
September 15, 2026
6:00PM-8:00PM

Location
Segal Theater
CUNY Graduate Center
365 Fifth Avenue, NY, NY 10016

This event is cosponsored by the Center for the Humanities, the Center for Place, Culture and Politics, the Advanced Certificate in LGBTQ Studies, and the Barnard Center for Research on Women.

07/15/2026

Please join us in congratulating Lisa Duggan, who has been selected to give the 2026 David R. Kessler Lecture. Duggan is the 34th winner of the Kessler Award, which honors sustained achievement in LGBTQ Studies. Please save the date: Friday, November 13, 2026 at 6:30PM at the CUNY Graduate Center.

06/30/2026

Today, and everyday, CLAGS is trans 🏳️‍⚧️

We are – and we think along with – transgender and nonbinary scholars.

We are – and we teach and learn from – undocumented and immigrant students.

We are – and we organize for – Black, Indigenous, People of Color community members.

We will continue to fight for trans lives, especially the lives and futures of trans youth. We know that we are not free until all of us are free.

Swipe through for resources and infrastructures of care provided by and

06/26/2026

We’ve reached $27,650 of our $30,000 goal for our 40th anniversary fundraiser finale this June! Please consider donating today to help CLAGS secure our future. CLAGS relies on donations to continue to offer free, public LGBTQ programming! Donation link in bio.
Ine past year nas been a special one at CLAGS as we celebrated the 40th anniversary ot our tounding in 1986.

Our historic year is not quite finished, though. Today CLAGS is kicking off a June fundraising drive. Please donate today to keep the future in our hands. We write this note with gratitude and urgency. Thank you for understanding that as CLAGS closes the chapter on our 40th year the next 40 years are not guaranteed. The next ten years are not guaranteed. We’ve seen how fast things can change when others control LGBTQ financial futures.

In case you missed it, please enjoy these highlights from an incredible year at CLAGS...
Angela Y. Davis helped us kick things off last June, and herstory making Tony Award Winner and founder of Black Trans Liberation Kitchen Qween Jean brought us home last week with the 10th Annual José Esteban Muñoz Award. In November, we were captivated by Robert Reid-Pharr’s Kessler lecture, “Faith”, and compelled by Anne Balay’s keynote address,
“Organizing Q***r Work: Gay Steelworkers, Trans Truckers, Feral Faculty,” at the Q***r-Class Relations Conference. For two days in October, we packed 700 people into the Le***an Lives conference!
Perhaps most importantly, CLAGS used its 40th anniversary platform to reject the quietude and acquiescence demanded by the Trump administration of organizations that dare to offer both q***r ideas and belonging to LGBTQ communities. We are so proud to say that in this moment, and drawing on its history, CLAGS thrived.

Thank you for helping us expand our work. We added fellowships for emerging scholars. We attracted and sought community collaboration. We launched new academic initiatives. We recommitted to our mission of providing free, accessible LGBTQ studies to everyone.If ever there was a time to put the wind in our sails and contribute to the financial future of CLAGS, this is it.

Address

365 5th Avenue, Rm 7115
New York, NY
10016

Website

https://linktr.ee/clagsny

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