7 queer African works of art: new directions in books, films and fashion: Queer African creatives have been making their mark around the world through a range of forms – books, films, fashion, art, music. Their work wins awards, sets trends and is studied by scholars. Most research on African queerness, however, comes from outside …
Daniel Craig’s turn as queer writer and an ‘unfilmable’ book brought to life – what you should watch, read and see this week: William S. Burroughs was a gay drug addict. A knot of contradictions, he was also deeply homophobic, sexist, racist and a gun-loving conservative, a passion that would eventually lead to him to …
Five MTV Video Music Awards performances that have influenced queer culture: The MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs) are always an important date in the queer cultural calendar. And the 2024 event, which took place on September 11, was no exception. Chappell Roan’s performance of Good Luck, Babe! is already one for the ages; looking at …
Hit Me Hard And Soft by Billie Eilish review – a flowing queer triumph that celebrates the album as a form: Billie Eilish’s new album Hit Me Hard and Soft is already fast on its way to becoming her third consecutive number one album. This album is reminiscent of her first – where her second …
Queer life in Africa is also full of joy – remembering the carnival in Mozambique: In late colonial Mozambique, in the city of Lourenço Marques (today’s Maputo), a carnival festival was held almost every year. From the 1950s to the 1970s, the event was more than just a street parade. It also became a space …
Nkoli: The Vogue Opera – the making of a musical about a queer liberation activist in South Africa: The history of South Africa’s struggle against apartheid (separatist white minority rule) is taught only through the broadest of brushstrokes in the country’s schools. So might music be a way to bring the story of one anti-apartheid …
Strange Way of Life review: Pedro Almodóvar’s 30-minute queer western is a tender miniature: Warning: this article contains spoilers for Strange Way of Life. Every genre film is engaged – as self-aware genre pastiches like the Scary Movie (2000) and Scream (1996) franchises cannily acknowledge – in a conversation with its predecessors. The western, the …
Queer film in Africa is rising – even in countries with the harshest anti-LGBTIQ+ laws: A recent book, Queer Bodies in African Films, studies the growing LGBTIQ+ output from film-makers around the continent, from Morocco to South Africa. In the process it analyses what queerness is and means within the context of African countries. Its …
Red, White & Royal Blue review – this queer romcom puts a new spin on the US and UK’s ‘special relationship’: Warning: contains spoilers for Red, White & Royal Blue. Global interest in the British royals has increased in recent years, thanks, in part, to the prominent romance between Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. So, …
Queer theory offers new views on daily life – even on infrastructure projects in Kenya: We Are/Getty Images I’ll confess I’ve raised quite a few eyebrows when I’ve told people about my research linking queer theory and infrastructure development. I understand the confusion. Queer theory is mainly associated with the study of gender, sexuality and …
Being queer in Africa: the state of LGBTIQ+ rights across the continent: Rajesh Jantilal/AFP via Getty Images In recent years several African countries have decriminalised same-sex relationships. But they’re not representative of the continent. In fact, queer rights at times appear to be eroding in much of the continent, with Kenya and Uganda most recently …
Abdellah Taïa is Morocco’s first openly gay writer – his work reimagines being Muslim, queer and African: Abdellah Taïa in Tangier, Morocco, in 2010. Abdelhak Senna/AFP via Getty Images Abdellah Taïa was born in 1973 in Rabat, Morocco. He currently lives in Paris. He is the first writer from north Africa – and in fact …
The Whale: Brendan Fraser’s comeback offers rare representation of the fat queer male body on screen: The Whale debuted at the 2022 Venice Film Festival to a six-minute standing ovation for its Academy Award-nominated lead, Brendan Fraser, who has returned to the big screen after a considerable hiatus. Fraser’s fame was amplified in the 2000s …
Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody review – a fleeting glimpse of queer black joy: I Wanna Dance with Somebody charts the life of global superstar Whitney Houston in an epic narrative of talent and struggle. The film lays bare the complexities of her rise and life in the spotlight, including toxic relationships with …
Simon Nkoli’s fight for queer rights in South Africa is finally being celebrated – 24 years after he died: Simon Nkoli (left) with activist and physician Ivan Toms in 1989. Courtesy Julia Nicol Collection/GALA Queer Archive Born in 1957, Simon Tseko Nkoli had just turned 41 when he died, in 1998, of an AIDS-related illness. …
#JusticeForSheila highlights the precarious lives of queer people in Kenya: A Nairobi protest against homophobic statements made by a government minister. JOHN OCHIENG/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images Kenya is one of 32 countries in Africa that criminalise homosexuality. People who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) are frequently stigmatised, shamed and assaulted. …
LGBT+ history: The Amazing Life of Margot Heuman – how theatre gave voice to a queer Holocaust survivor: Many Holocaust plays feature Jewish teenagers coming of age in the shadow of the death camps. Yet these works often present sentimentalised, redemptive stories, such as the 1950s production of The Diary of Anne Frank. They foreground …
The queer city: how to design more inclusive public space: Making inclusivity a visible and a structural component of urban planning is crucial Tayla Kohler | Unsplash, FAL Most people might not usually think of public space as being gendered, but this is how scholars of the built environment increasingly talk about it. In many …