Pride Week 2016 to host drag show, photo shoot
Pride Week 2016 events will run next week from April 11 to the 14.
Several events throughout the week include a drag show, a "silence photo shoot" and safe zone training.
To kick off Pride Week, a panel entitled "Who Owns the Femme Identity?" will begin at noon on April 11 in the Bovee University Center Terrace Rooms. The event is a panel discussion on the ways being feminine effects the experiences of members of the LGBT community.
At 7 p.m. on Monday, April 11, keynote speaker Z Nicolazzo will speak in the Bovee University Center Terrace Rooms. Nicolazzo will be hosting “'I’m Looking at the [Wo]man in the Mirror:' The Politics of Invisibility at the Present Queer Moment." The event will focus the relationship between visibility and vulnerability in the LGBT community.
Nicolazzo is an assistant professor at Northern Illinois University who has published work in LGBT Youth, Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, Journal of Critical Scholarship on Higher Education and Student Affairs and more.
On Tuesday, April 12 three events take place in the UC.
The informational session "Trans 201," will take place from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. A location that has not yet been determined. A question and answer session will take place afterward, in which the audience can ask panelists questions about transgender issues.
From 5 to 6 p.m., "No Other Option: When Gay Rights becomes Queer Assimilation" will be hosted in the Center for Inclusion and Diversity. The event is interactive, and focuses on the ways queer and transgender people in the United States are forced to "assimilate into heteronormative institutions and practices," according to the event's Facebook.
A gender inclusive sexual education event will be held from 7 to 8 p.m. in the Maroon Room at the Bovee University Center. Hosts will discuss with the audience how to practice safe sex, the subject of consent and more.
On Wednesday, April 13 the "Silence Shoot" and drag show will take place.
From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the Lake Huron Room, photographer Matthew Pruitt will lead a photo shoot in which participants will wear red tape over their mouths in solidarity with members of the LGBT community who were bullied or have committed suicide due to their gender or sexual orientation.
Later that night, from 7 to 10 p.m., the drag show starring Sabin the drag queen will be hosted in Plachta Auditorium.
Pride Week will conclude with two additional events on Thursday, April 14.
Safe Zone training will take place from 1 to 3 p.m. in the Bovee University Center Isabella Room. A presentation entitled "Sexual Aggression in the LGBTQ+ Community" will end Pride Week, beginning at 7 p.m. in Moore 105. The Office of LGBTQ Services has partnered with Sexual Aggression Peer Advocates to educate students on sexual aggression within the LGBT community.
