Sobremesa

In keeping with our love of the kitchen table as a radical and relational space, we organize and facilitate sobremesas around topics of shared interest. Think of these as salons for groups of 8-10 participants who can expect a lite fare and purposeful discussions around matters that matter. When meeting F2F, dietary restrictions will be accommodated. Topics of discussion can range from art and writing to politics and current events as well as community needs.

Select readings, writings, art, and/or other project proposals will be circulated in advance of each sobremesa, which will last 2 hours and be designed to meet the identified needs for support of the submitter/s. Submitters will work with one of us to identify and invite community participants.

Virtual Sobremesas are also an option!

The Art of Change Agency hosted its first sobremesa in December, 2019:

Title & Presenter: Telling to Transform: LGBTQI Migrants Protest Detention, Eithne Luibhéid

Summary: Drawing on Kimberlé Crenshaw’s framework of “lives that resist the telling,” this talk centers a 2016 protest at an LGBTQ immigrant detention facility in California. It argues that the protest shows how violence and domination seek to make LGBTQI migrants’ lives unlivable and their experiences untellable. Yet the protest, which highlighted LGBTQI migrants not just as targets of violent migration and asylum systems, but also as leaders in resisting, suggests rich possibilities for transformation.

Context: Eithne is among this year’s keynote speakers at the Queer Displacements: Sexuality, Migration & Exile conference in Australia. The first of its kind in Australia, this conference aims to bring together academics, practitioners and LGBTIQ+ people seeking asylum and refugees to discuss pertinent issues of queer forced displacement and foster dialogue between official and unofficial groups invested in research and practice for coordinated solutions and better support of affected populations.

Sobremesa: We will break bread, make connections, discuss LGBTQI resistance and leadership and consider how we can support the goals of those directly affected by LGBTQI refugee and migration struggles. To spark our discussion, Eithne will circulate her remarks from this conference in advance of our sobremesa.

Contact Adela to propose a topic for discussion.