CUNY DIGITAL HISTORY ARCHIVE

This poster promotes the Local Politics Global Change conference which was held on April 23rd and 24th, 1999 under the sponsorship of CLAGS and the NYU Faculty Working Group on Queer Studies. The central aim of the conference was to explore the possibilities of a queer future as imagined by academics and activists. As part of the conference, Barbara Smith, lesbian and black feminist scholar known for her work with the Combahee River Collective and the founder of Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, presented on issues of queer politics. José Muñoz presented on Violence and Policing. A decade later, Muñoz went on to publish Cruising Utopia, a critical look at modern queer movements and a call for queer activism beyond assimilationist issues such as marriage equality.

Although formally instituted at the CUNY Graduate Center in 1991, CLAGS: The Center for LGBTQ Studies was first conceived 5 years earlier by Martin, Duberman, one of the first historians to embrace the, then infantile, field of Queer Studies. Duberman sensed the need for a formal center devoted to queer research. As the first university-based center for LGBTQ research, CLAGS continues to demonstrate its dedication to advancing Queer Studies, by hosting public events showcasing queer research and sponsoring fellowships to support queer scholars. Among its many notable contributions, CLAGS annually puts on at least one major conference and holds the Kessler Award Lecture every fall to celebrate a queer scholar who has made a notable contribution to the field of queer studies.