ShOUT – Queer West Young Adult Program & Unconferences @ Masaryk-Cowan Community Centre
This month?
Queer West Shout Youth Program
Queer West Motto – Building a Community Strengthening the City
All Positive & Respectful Folk are Welcome to attend!
ShOUT! Queer West Young Adult (Un)Conferences
Second in a Series – Wednesday March 31, 2010
Unconference format
“ShOUT is an Unconference” A Participant-Facilitated Discussion
OUTtv.ca and Youth Employment Services and the Gay West Community Network Inc. (Queer West) have initiated a series of monthly community events through the SHOUT Unconference Program for Young Adults.
The Program offers Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Transsexual, Intersexed, Queer, Questioning and Two-Spirited (LGBTTIQQ2) youth and their friends and allies (ages 20 to 30 something) residing in West-Central Toronto with a focus on Parkdale, an innovative series of live monthly events that aim to stimulate a needed community dialogue on a wide range of pertinent topics to them.
Each month a wide range of topics pertinent to young adults with an emphasis on the theme of gender and sexuality in the arts and in culture in doing so, ShOUT! provides a safe, supportive and enriching context in which its participants can foster new knowledge, skills, and above all, meaningful relationships in their community.
ShOUT! Queer West Young Adult (Un)Conference Series
Presents…
MAKE CULTURE JAM!!
Anyone with something to contribute or with the desire to learn
is welcome and invited to join the discussion on…
Guerrilla Art, Media-Making and Creative Resistance
“As consumers of empowerment, our autonomy is only expressed through the act of choosing. By creating new choices for ourselves, and expanding opportunities for empowerment outside of the consumer sphere, we can be activists in the best sense of the word.”
~Carly Stasko
In her article, Action Grrrls in the Dream Machine,
Part of Turbo Chicks: Talking Young Feminisms (Sumach Press 2001)
ShOUT poster by Jaclyn Isen
Using the culture-jamming inspiration of our participating guerilla artists and independent media-makers, our discussion tonight will focus on a plethora of subversive expressions (zine-making, graffiti, stencil and sticker art, print, performance and blogging, are a few examples) through which marginalized folk exert their voices and insert themselves into a cultural landscape where they are seldom seen, heard or validated.
Together, we will explore the extent to which these creative practices work as a “queer” tactic of resistance and as a process of personal and political transformation and healing.
Discussion Sparkers
1) First and foremost, what exactly IS a Culture Jam?
(hint: think about the multiple meanings of “jam” as a metaphor for what a culture jam might aim to accomplish)
i—a sweet preservative, ii—a predicament, iii—a blockage wedged into the machinery
2) What makes a particular Jam successful and why? Do all examples of parody and satire necessarily count as jams?
3) Feminist artist and academic, Allyson Mitchell, has called writings on public spaces by lesbians and feminists and other forms of political graffiti “emergency story-telling”. Why do you think the impulse to tell our stories is so urgent? In what ways does the exercise of personal narrative, which we see in a variety of jamming mediums (including zines, and blogs) function as a potent political tool?
4) What is a “zine”? The “DIY-Movement”? and “craftivism”? and what is their relationship to an anti-corporate/anti-capitalist politic and sub-culture?
5) Many jammers and independent cultural producers, work to reconfigure, denaturalize, mess with, and “queer” conventions that dictate who gets legitimate space carved out in urban environments, who really belongs there, and whose voices are authorized to speak and be heard. Considering this, how are the artistic processes and methods used by jammers as important as the messages themselves that they communicate?
For example, think about why a jammer would choose a particular site (either physical, visual or virtual) as the setting for their jam. Why is it significant that zines are often hand-written rather than typed? How can scissors and glue be political tools as much as they are crafting instruments? How does a xerox machine function to legitimate the illegitimate?
6) Some critics may see zine making and blogging and artistic expression in general as merely a narcissistic catharsis for the self indulgent, rather than as a form of politics. To what degree can the various creative resistance practices we’ve discussed, actually be reframed as a valid form of activism, despite that that they may not enact policy change directly?
7) Toronto culture jammer, and media tigress, Carly Stasko, implied in the opening epigraph (see above) that empowerment is a commodity to be consumed. What does she mean by this? How can we develop a critically queer eye for the ways in which LGBT lifestyles are being co-opted by those in power? At whose expense do certain identities and bodies gain visibility?
Thought Provoking Topic Resource Links
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Local Toronto artist, Daryl Vocat does a lot of guerillla-type art. Visit his web site Infestant Propaganda
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Another group of performance artists/jammers called “Finger in the Dyke Productions“www.fingerinthedyke.ca/ they internationally known, (Famous for their “Lesbian National Parks and Services… piece).
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Similar, Professor Allyson Mitchell a Toronto maximalist artist, into radical and lesbian feminisms, through alternative curatorial projects. www.allysonmitchell.com/AMbio.cfm
Presenters Biographies
(More presenters to be listed)
Sarah Pinder (Presenter)
Sarah Pinder is a writer, teacher and recovering academic living in Toronto. A zine-maker of nearly 10 years, her work has been shortlisted for the Expozine Small Press awards, as well as NOW Magazine’s Best of Toronto. She has been published in the anthology She’s Shameless, invisible city, Canadian Woman Studies, and Room. You can also find her zines in the Distroboto art vending machines around Montreal. Once an editor for Existere magazine, Sarah now writes for Broken Pencil. Follow her here: bitsofstring.wordpress.com
Jaclyn Isen, shOUT! Project Director
Jaclyn Alia Isen (Moderator)
Queer West Vice President and Shout Project Director
Come meet the visionary behind tonight’s new Queer West Young Adult Program Unconferences.
Jaclyn Alia Isen is one of Queer West Arts Collective’s newest members, joining the Board of Directors and initiating the ShOUT! Young Queer Adult (Un)conference Program in December 2009. Jaclyn is a creative and eager generation Y’er and a proud Parkdalian with an ongoing craving for queer and feminist theory and community.
Jac holds a Masters of Arts in Women’s Studies from the University of Western Ontario, has taught an introductory undergraduate tutorial in Women’s Studies and has participated in a number of conferences on the topics of gender and sexuality.
She has developed a great deal of experience in organizing arts-based community programming in her role as the Community Outreach Coordinator for a wonderful independent feminist business on the Danforth called Red Tent Sisters.
Jaclyn is a woman-loving-woman, and generally a people-loving-person, who holds a fierce belief in the power of the arts to educate, cultivate, heal and transform community. She is currently pursuing a Masters of Education in Adult Education and Community Development at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at University of Toronto.
Teaser Videos
In Video Below: Featuring footage from the 2007 Portland Zine Symposium, a zine bicycle tour of Portland, and activities bringing zine culture to life. An original documentary culled from over 64 hours of footage. Best suited for people with a new interest in zines, pros, and novices. Artwork by Cristy Road and music by J Church and Defiance, OH! Created by Basil Shadid, Rev. Phil Sano, Nickey Robo, and Joe Biel.
In video below, Toronto Culture Jammer Carly Stasko is a self-titled Imagitator who agitates imagination as a Toronto-based but globally inspired artist, writer, activist, producer and holistic educator. Carly is interested in love, healing, jamming with culture, as well as working and playing towards environmental and social justice through education and the arts. You might find her presenting workshops on media literacy and indymedia activism in high schools and universities across North America. Visit her web site: http://www.intrinsik.net/
In Video Below: Social activism through street art. Frank Shepard Fairey (Born February 15, 1970 in Charleston, South Carolina) is a contemporary artist, graphic designer, and illustrator who emerged from the skateboarding scene. The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston calls him one of today’s best known and most influential street artists.
The SHOUT evening is Free and Wheelchair Accessible. Vegetarian food, cupcakes and green tea, will be provided.
ShOUT- Happens on last Wednesday of every month From 6:30 pm to 8: 30 pm at the Masaryk-Cowan Community Centre, 220 Cowan Avenue (Toronto Parkdale) Street Map In the warmer months it will be held outdoors at various locations in the city. Families welcome to attend too. Queer West Office 416-879-7954 Program Manager and Queer West, Vice President : Jaclyn Isen: qwshout@gmail.com
Join Queer West’s mailing list get all the news and our events every two weeks. Become a member of Arts Collective. Stay informed with The Bent eBlast
ShOUT is brought to you by our Fabulous Sponsors
Bent Expressions Newspaper | Queer West Arts and Culture Centre| Youth Employment Services| OUTtv.ca | Naco Gallery & Cafe| IvarDesign.com| | Lesbian Social Business NetworK (LSBN) | Parkdale Liberty Villager Newspaper | Swagger
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