[Content warnings: discussion or mention of death, grief, terminal illness, mental health, HIV/AIDS, hate crime, police brutality, homelessness and the asylum system.]

This is a call for submissions for a zine about LGBTQIA+ and queerspawn* experiences of grief. This zine will focus specifically on experiences of grief due to death or ongoing terminal illness.

*Queerspawn is a term used to describe people who have (or had) one or more LGBTQIA+ parents or caregivers.

Criteria

You are eligible to submit to this zine if you are LGBTQIA+ and/or queerspawn and have experienced grief due to the death or ongoing terminal illness of a person in your life. You are still eligible to submit if the person or people who you grieved (or are grieving) were/are not LGBTQIA+ and/or queerspawn themselves.

The work you create for this zine must in some way deal with the way in which grief intersects with LGBTQIA+ and/or queerspawn identity, culture or experiences.

The work you create for this zine must not have been published elsewhere.

The work you create can be in any form, such as writing or visual art, that is suitable for print.

Privacy

If you are concerned about privacy and your work is selected for the zine, you are welcome to request for it to be published anonymously or under a pseudonym.

How to submit

If you would like to submit a piece of work for this zine please submit the most recent draft of your piece to queergriefzine@gmail.com by 1st July 2017 at 23:59 British Summer Time (BST).

The curator of Queer Grief Zine will contact you by 31st July 2017 to let you know whether or not your piece has been selected for the zine.

Queer Grief Zine is interested in work about:

- Experiences of being an LGBTQIA+ person or queerspawn in grief spaces such as individual or group therapy, informal healing spaces, funerals and other death rituals or ceremonies.

- Ways that your LGBTQIA+ community supported you in your grief.

- Ways that your LGBTQIA+ community did not make space for your grief.

- How colleagues, classmates, teachers, bosses, friends, neighbours, family and acquaintances interacted with you during or after your loss and how this intersected with your identity as an LGBTQIA+ person and/or queerspawn.

- Experiences of loosing someone who was not ‘out’ as LGBTQIA+ and/or queerspawn when they died or of not being ‘out’ yourself when you experienced the loss.

- Ways that being LGBTQIA+ and/or queerspawn has impacted the extent to which people understand and respect your relationship to the person who you were (or are) grieving, and how this has impacted your experience of grief.

- The intersection of your experience of grief, being LGBTQIA and/or queerspawn, and another aspect of your identity such as gender, class, race, disability or immigration status.

- Any other ways that being LGBTQIA+ and/or queerspawn has impacted your experience of grief.

- LGBTQIA+ rights issues that intersect with death, such as mental health, HIV/AIDS, hate crime, police brutality, homelessness and the asylum system.

- Imagining grief spaces or grief support that is inclusive of, or specifically for, LGBTQIA+ people and/or queerspawn – what would that involve? What would it look, sound or feel like?

- Books, films, music, TV, art or other media that deal with the intersection of grief and LGBTQIA and/or queerspawn identity e.g. in the form of reviews or commentary.

- The systemic ways in which grief is stigmatised and policed in society and how this intersects with LGBTQIA+ and/or queerspawn identities.

- Any other political or cultural commentary on the intersection of grief and LGBTQIA+ and/or queerspawn identities.



Please contact Queer Grief Zine via email at queergriefzine@gmail.com or through social media if you have any questions about this project.