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Dissolving the Divide: Black Men Who Love Men Embracing Leadership is a day-long conference organized and sponsored by the Black Men’s Xchange-New York in Association with the Center For Gay & Lesbian Studies of the Graduate Center of the City University of New York – 365 fifth Avenue, (at 34th St.) Manhattan, on Saturday, October 14th, 2006.
ISSUE: In general, Black males still face disproportionate quality of life, health, political and self-concept challenges in America. Black males with same gender love and desire endure the same dilemmas with the additional impediments of dehumanizing attitudes from family, community, Black institutions and each other. Simultaneously, same gender loving (SGL) Black males – youth and adults – endure an increased likelihood of living with HIV/AIDS, internalized oppression, isolation, fear, misunderstanding and frustration. These pressures can incite fragmentation that cause us to operate at cross purposes with ourselves and each other. The universe is waiting for SGL men to collectively transform and attend to ourselves, each other and our community; to be “Gatekeepers,” occupying roles in the Black community here like the traditional leadership roles embodied by SGL people in the Dagara culture, as described by Malidome Somé in “Of Water and the Spirit,” and “The Healing Wisdom of Africa.”
Conference Purpose:
The conference seeks to clear a space for a strategic, systematic examination and greater management of the forces, ideas, behaviors, conditions and world views that disrupt capacity among same gender loving, gay identified and bisexual Black males to come together and cooperatively motivate, heal, inform and transform ourselves and each other, in order to redress the challenges facing Black men.
Call for Abstracts
Theories of Black male leadership affect cultural critique, public policy and community activism. In spite of this radical potential, Black SGL male leadership often remains a challenging vacancy both in academe and in the world. Dissolving the Divide is calling for abstracts of papers from writers, scholars, activists and artists focusing on Black homosexual identity and the intersection of race and sexual identity, that will contribute to the identification and articulation of progressive same gender loving Black male leadership.
Selected papers for the Dissolving the Divide conference will explore diverse perspectives, paradigms and strategies that deconstruct barriers and solutions to Black SGL cooperation and power. Conveners will ensure that presenters represent complex, disruptive, transformational and liberating theoretical stances within and beyond the academy, and make real social change proposals. Same gender loving Black males and allies are invited to dissect and analyze the truths, speculations, complaints and remedies to the dangerous divisions uniquely faced by homosexual and bisexual Black males.
Please submit abstracts (300-500 words) by August 28th to: johnmartingreen@aol.com, or to:
The Black Men’s Xchange-New York
730 Riverside Dr., Ste. 9E
NY, NY 10031
Topics may include, but are not limited to:
Why the Divide?
Twenty Five Years Later: Black Men Newly Infected w/HIV. Why?
Models and Ideals of Political SGL Black Leadership
The Black Gay Movement – Fact or Fiction
What Is Black Gay Pride?
The SGL Movement – Fact or Fiction
Homophobia in the Black Community?
Nationalist SGL Black Male Leadership
Transnational SGL Black Male Leadership
Performative SGL Black Male Leadership.
Perspectives on Homosexual Black Identity.
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