Vision: Reading q***r will provide the community with a platform for self exploration and self-expression and will demonstrate how creative writing can be used as a medium to improve, empower, and enrich the creative lives of the community. Changing deeply-rooted misconceptions of q***rness inside and outside of our community necessitates a new language. Reading Q***r will foster a dialogue betwee
n gay, le***an, bisexual, trans* and intersexed writers and the larger community. Individual voices will come together to connect, create and communicate what it means to be q***r and to dispel myths that disempower and dehumanize. Our ongoing mission is to ensure that our community thrives and that our stories continue to be told. With dedication and compassion, Reading Q***r aims to promote Miami as a vibrant and diverse center for q***r literature. Why we chose our name Reading “Q***r”? : In Diane Raymond’s essay “Popular Culture and Q***r Representation”, she defines “q***r” as a universalizing term that embraces more fluid categories. Raymond writes: ”Q***r is a category in flux. Once a term of homophobic abuse, recently the term has been reappropriated as a marker for some gay, le***an, bisexual, transgender (glbt), and other marginalized sexual identities….The term is itself open-ended, and its advocates argue that its fluidity is to be embraced rather than ‘fixed’….’q***r’ is politically radical, rejects binary categories (homosexual/heterosexual), embraces more fluid categories, and tends to be ‘universalizing’ rather than ‘minoritizing’….”
