Generating Queers: The LGBTQ+ Intergenerational Dialogue Project

• In Event: Learnings About Queer and Trans Issues Across Educational Setting

Abstract

The LGBTQ+ Intergenerational Dialogue project explores the educational potential of community-based intergenerational dialogues. Recognizing the ways homophobia and transphobia have historically thwarted intergenerational queer relationships, particularly within schools, this project provided participants a long-term opportunity to engage members of different generations through commonalities and differences. Taking place over the course of an academic year (September 2019-August 2020), the co-conveners brought together 12 LGBTQ identified young adults (18-26) with 12 LGBTQ identified elders (65+) to engage in bi-weekly dialogues. The co-conveners and participants offer their analysis the dialogue project’s model of educational responsibility rooted in LGBTQ+ stories and lives. As an educational initiative it provided ways to model intergenerational communication around topics such as activism, gender, sex, and HIV/AIDS.

Authors

• Adam Joseph Greteman, School of the Art Institute of Chicago

• Karen Morris, School of the Art Institute of Chicago