If we have mostly come to see, think and listen “like states”—attributing harmony and symmetry and order to state rule, and seeing dissonance and disorder as part and parcel of anarchy, then one of the primary functions for protest art in this era might just be to enable and enact new visions, new sounds and new aesthetics of being – in the process of engaging, participating and enjoying protest art, we redefine politics, art and desire itself. In what follows, I want to follow a trail of potentially anarchistic and avowedly queer image making to see where it may lead, to ask what aesthetics emerge from this derive, what worlds can be glimpsed, what new modes of distraction, disruption and disorder they offer us and what, finally, queerness looks like in the wild.

Judith (Jack) Halberstam, Ph.D. is one of the leading voices in gender theory and queer studies. She has also written extensively on literature, film and visual arts. Judith Halberstam exploded into the forefront of gender studies with her book Female Masculinity. Judith Halberstam has also written the books The Drag King Book, Skin Shows: Gothic Horror and the Technology of Monsters, andIn a Queer Time and Place: Transgender Bodies, Subcultural Lives. Judith Halberstam teaches at the University of Southern California. She holds a professorship and directorship of The Center for Feminist Research. Judith Halberstam has also received invitations to lecture on Gender Studies at Harvard University and the University of Basel, Switzerland. Judith Halberstam’s honors include receiving Compton-Noll Award for Best LGBT Essay, UCSD Humanities Center Fellowship, Awarded the Publisher’s Triangle Judy Grahn Award for Lesbian Non-Fiction for Female Masculinity, REFLAGS Visiting Professor of Gay and Lesbian Studies at Yale University, and Draper Postdoctoral Fellow, Liberal Studies, NYU.

All lectures take place on Mondays from 5-7PM in New Academic Building LG 02