Arts & Sciences Events
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Arts & Sciences
[PAST EVENT] Blue Collar Confidential: Why gay steelworkers remain closeted and how that's changing
November 5, 2014
7pm
Anne Balay, author of Steel Closets: Voices of Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Steelworkers (University of North Carolina, 2014).
Until recently when the general public, or even well-informed scholars, imagined gay people, blue-collar workers (or mid-westerners, or rural dwellers, or racial minorities) were not included. Steel Closets is part of a movement to expand that vision, transforming how we understand both blue-collar workers and contemporary queerness. This talk focuses on why gay steelworkers opted to remain invisible, and how and why that is now changing. I demonstrate how narrative--both the telling and the hearing of stories--can change lives and foster social justice.
Until recently when the general public, or even well-informed scholars, imagined gay people, blue-collar workers (or mid-westerners, or rural dwellers, or racial minorities) were not included. Steel Closets is part of a movement to expand that vision, transforming how we understand both blue-collar workers and contemporary queerness. This talk focuses on why gay steelworkers opted to remain invisible, and how and why that is now changing. I demonstrate how narrative--both the telling and the hearing of stories--can change lives and foster social justice.