I really appreciated all of the readings and videos from this week. Dark Matter’s poetry and performance is extremely moving. Alok is on instagram and facebook and I highly recommend following them if you are also on those platforms. In Trans/Generation, addressing why they don’t smile in family photos as a form of resistance, the silence and violence inherited from men, and the rage that their grandmother puts into her painting- as gender for short, narrates all the ways in which the gender binary enacted onto society creates so many different forms of violence and oppression. In When Brown looks in the Mirror…calling out the english language, a language for hurting, reminded me of our discussion in class of Cereus and what it meant when Mala stopped speaking english. I had seen LaWhore Vagistan’s video #SarinotSorry before and really appreciated reading this interview. LaWhore Vagistan talks about how she worked toward her drag persona and performance. She also discusses the role of the auntie in various ways and how that cultural support and knowledge comes from many different places and travels in many different ways. She also talks about the slippage between her drag persona and no drag persona. And how Vagistan represents the rupture and separation between India and Pakistan and the affects this had on her family. Roy’s short story addressed his experience being gay in the midwest and how white supremacy informs the exotifying and fethishism that he experiences within white gay culture. I really loved the poems by Leah Lakshmi Piepza-Samarasinha and how she discusses queer culture and diaspora living in the bay area. Also what it is like living with mcs among other chronic illnesses that limits the way in which she and others can interact in a space. My city is a hard femme was my favorite poem, completely unapologetic femmedom and how that is related to a city space.