A Pembroke Seminar “In the Afterlives and Aftermaths of Ruin” Talk

The Black Bedroom

By Shoniqua Roach, Assistant Professor of African and African American Studies and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Brandeis University

EVENT DETAILS:

Tuesday, April 4, 2023

5:30 p.m.

Pembroke Hall 305

While both Black and Queer studies have frequently theorized the domestic and its interiors (e.g., the closet) as paradigmatic spaces from which (Black) queer subjects should flee, Black feminist critical and creative archives have historically reimagined the Black home as a crucial locus of gender and sexual freedom in the face of state-sanctioned surveillance of, and incursions into, Black life. Extending this Black feminist conceptualization of the possibilities of the Black domestic, this talk theorizes the Black home—specifically, the Black bedroom therein–as a dense and luscious site of polymorphous play, erotic experimentation, and unrelenting vitality.

Free and open to the public. 

Accessibility information: To bypass stairs, visitors may enter via the automatic doors at the rear of the building, where there is a wheelchair-accessible elevator.