The need for diversity goes beyond ethnicity, and sexual diversity is the focus of two upcoming conferences for professors and students.
From Friday through Sunday, faculty from Chico State and campuses throughout the California State University system will gather during the third annual Queer Studies Consortium Meeting to network, share ideas and learn about teaching sexual diversity.
Sara Cooper, a professor of Spanish and women's studies who is helping organize the consortium, said she hopes the meeting will increase awareness of queer studies.
Queer studies is the study of the experiences, accomplishments and lives of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and queer people, or GLBTQ people.
"This is a legitimate area of diversity studies," Cooper said. "Our students are going out into a global society where they need to understand and be respectful of all people."
GLBTQ students in college have often felt ignored and unrepresented. But their stories and experiences are just as legitimate as heterosexuals', Cooper said.
"This is another minority that may wish to study their history and their possibilities," she said.
This year, a minor in sexual diversity studies was approved, making Chico State the third campus in the CSU system to offer such a minor.
This shows topics like sexual diversity are becoming less taboo, Cooper said.
"It's in the press, it's in the movies, magazines, literature," she said. "It's not just private life anymore."
One topic that has been in the public eye recently is religion and homosexuality, which will be the subject of a presentation during the consortium by Jerry Maneker, a professor of sociology at Chico State and ordained Catholic priest.
Maneker said he hopes people will attend the conference, even if they don't fully agree with what he or the other presenters have to say.
"I would like people to come who are really on the fence about GLBTQ rights," he said. "They're the ones that need to hear it."
Workshops and presentations will be held during the weekend dealing with subjects such as sexual minorities and the law, teaching transgender issues, sexual diversity within ethnic minorities and many other issues.
The keynote speaker, Harriet Malinowitz, is an English professor at Long Island University and the author of "Textual Orientations: Lesbian and Gay Students and the Making of Discourse Communities." She will be speaking at 3:30 p.m. Saturday in Ayres Hall Room 106.
In April, the Women's Center's eighth annual women's conference theme will be "Exploring Sexual Diversities Through Activism."
Program coordinator Christina Dahlerup said encouraging people to learn about activism could help them deal with anger and helplessness they may feel about issues of gender and discrimination.
"Whenever I've taken women's studies classes I've felt, 'Well, I'm really pissed off, what am I going to do about it?'"
On April 21 an evening comedy performance by Monica Palacios will kick off the event, followed by a day of activist training and workshops on April 22. The keynote address by author Kate Bornstein and workshops on sexual and gender diversities will be featured April 23. Tickets are $10 for one day and $20 for both days and can be purchased at the Women's Center.
Kelly Reed can be reached at
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