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What A ‘Nancy’: Hosts Tobin Low and Kathy Tu Talk Queer Podcast

Posted on October 16, 2017
A photo of Kathy Tu and Tobin Low, hosts of the queer podcast Nancy.

As 20-something Dominique Crisden speaks, his voice carries a tone of youthful optimism. Across from him sits David Gable, his face and voice hardened with age, wisdom, and experience. Though generations apart, both are gay men. Both are HIV-positive. The elder looks into the younger’s eyes before asking the question that has brought them together: “Did we go through a plague for nothing? Did we learn anything?” This is the caliber of storytelling presented on Nancy, a new radically-inclusive, surprisingly deep…

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Don’t Let ‘It’ Get To You: Facing Your Childhood Fears with the King of Horror

Posted on October 13, 2017
An illustration of the horror movie It.

My childhood was texturized by horror films, particularly adaptations of King’s work. People still gasp when they hear I watched the original Carrie and It before age 10, The Shining by age 12, along with a host of other classics in between. In Kentucky, I would always spend a night at my Aunt Judy’s and we’d huddle under blankets while watching a horror movie on her wood-paneled TV. I say they left traces; my friend says, “more like craters in your…

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Meet Fran Watson: Queer Black Houston Lawyer and Activist Seeks Texas Senate Seat

Posted on October 10, 2017
A photo of Texas Senate District 17 candidate Fran Watson.

As an assistant professor of Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies and Comparative Cultural Studies at University of Houston, I’m particularly thrilled to see candidates who make the Texas political landscape reflective of the diversity of Houston. I’ve had the privilege of getting to know Fran Watson through the city’s LGBTQ activist networks, and have seen her consistently show up to serve and engage with many different Texas communities. Fran and I traveled to Austin together this spring—as part of a…

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Love is Love is Love: Producing Queer Theatre in the Deep South

Posted on October 9, 2017
A photo from Glow Lyric Theatre's production of Love is Love is Love

I booked a venue for the evening of Valentine’s Day, and asked 10 LGBTQ singers, actors, dancers, poets, and artists from the community to help me jump-start the project. We all gathered together. Unsure of how to start, I asked everyone what message they wanted the piece to convey. At this question, the room bubbled over with stories of young love, first times, heartbreak, and the loss of love. Their vulnerability reminded me that the feelings and situations surrounding love…

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‘Welcome to the Jungle’: A Mother and Son Trip to Vietnam and Cambodia

Posted on October 6, 2017
A photo of author Josh Inocéncio at Angkor Wat in Cambodia and Vietnam.

Our last mother and son venture—to New York City in 2014—was shattered of all joy when I came out to her as gay at the airport before we departed Houston. But hey, she coaxed me. That, and since my dad and I had hiked Mt. Fuji in Japan, my mom hungered for a trip with me. And I wanted her to go, especially amid the busyness of her new position at work. She longs to see the world, and we…

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Teaching Queer Houston: Part One

Posted on October 4, 2017
A photo of queer Houston participating in a Pride march against Anita Bryant.

When I began teaching Intro to LGBT Studies at the University of Houston in Fall 2016, I barely took the local queer community into consideration when I designed the course. Aside from having my students watch the documentary A Murder in Montrose about the Paul Broussard murder in 1991, my course was largely void of queer Houston content. This was surprising given my focus on local communities in my research and advocacy work. Even so, while discussing the events following Paul…

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Your Friendly Neighborhood Queer: Rooster Teeth’s Mariel Salcedo

Posted on September 29, 2017
A photo of Mariel Salcedo on Always Open on Rooster Teeth.

Mariel Salcedo has become a Rooster Teeth fan favorite, previously producing and guest starring in the now cult classic, Free Play, before taking on her current role on Always Open. For the production company’s LGBTQ devotees, however, she’s more than a comedic Internet celebrity—she’s someone they can connect to on a deeper level, someone they can call their own.…

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‘I Feel That I Have Arrived’: The Journey of a Southern Latina Trans Health Advocate

Posted on September 27, 2017
A photo of Latina trans health advocate Lea Córdova.

When you meet Lea Córdova, MA, MS, you don't know what is more astonishing: the action-packed life she has lived as a Latina trans health advocate, or the fact that this irrepressible dynamo is in fact 76 years old. Lea and I have seen each other at LGBTQ and activist events around North Carolina for many years, and I've come to admire her as one of my elders. I caught up with her on a sunny September afternoon, shortly after she'd…

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