About Seminars in the City
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Led by Eric Keenaghan, assistant professor, Department of English at SUNY-Albany

The concept of "security" has been important to queer politics insofar as it is central to human rights discourses. Recently, though, ideas of "security" and even of "the human" have been perverted. With the establishment of Homeland Security state, they now read as concepts supporting nationalism and a fear of difference. Just how much has our activism and theory become reproductive of conservative nation-state ideologies, then? Can we take a different approach to security so as to disentangle it from a dangerous nationalism? Can we find value in its opposite, the citizen's vulnerability? These questions will be the core for this seminar's discussions. Before the first meeting, participants are asked to read Judith Butler's "Precarious Life" (Verso, 2004), and examine the following documents (available online): the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) and the U.S. government's National Strategy for Homeland Security (2002).

To register for the Seminar, which will meet Thursdays, February 8, March 8, April 12, and May 10, 6-8pm each night at the LGBT Community Center, please contact the CLAGS office at 212-817-1955. You may also email your registration request, along with any special needs you may have, to clags@gc.cuny.edu.

This event is made possible, in part, by a grant from the New York Council for the Humanities, a state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

In a partnership with The Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center, the monthly series offers an informal but intellectually charged environment for addressing major works of LGTBQ studies. The aim is to make complex and often abstruse ideas engaging for nonacademic readers. Previous Seminars leaders, themselves CLAGS board members, have found the Seminars experience "a delight." Anne Pellegrini, who taught "Introduction to Queer Theory" in the fall of 1998 recalls that, "the experience was a powerful and pleasurable reminder of the vital links possible between the academy and the streets, theory and living."

Elizabeth Freeman, who is a former CLAGS Board Member and the first organizer of the series, is proud of its success so far. Freeman says that the many semesters have generated a great deal of excitement, and the conversations in the seminars have been provocative, spirited, and insightful. "The success has already given us a sense of the intellectual, political, and artistic energy that thinkers outside the academy contribute to our shared inquiry," says Freeman. Each semester centers around a particular theme and is led by a CLAGS Board member with an expertise in the field.

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