Next week, on Tuesday March 21st, 2017, another session of Book Club is going to happen in LGBT* community centre. This time with the epithet “Queer Feminist” we are going to discuss the non-fiction book Argonauts written by Maggie Nelson. It is already fifth time that we are going to meet at this opportunity. What actually is Book Club about and how has it started?
The idea of Book Club is to meet up in a cosy atmosphere with the cup of tea and discuss a particular topic according the literature that participants read in advance. The initial focus of Book Club is on feminism and its intersections with LGBT* topics. However, it is a participative project, so it is open for proposals from participants. We have already discussed various topics based on both fiction and non-fiction literature, starting from feminist biologist Anne Fausto-Sterling`s insights on sex and gender, through intersection of feminism with vegetarianism to the myth of beauty. We have read also part of the novel “Why be happy when you could be normal?”.
In ideal case participants read the chosen chapter in advance, but it is not necessary. There were people attending the session who haven`t read the chapter in advance, but ended up saying that they would like to read the book afterwards. So it is definitely worth to come also if you are just interested in the topic and discussion.
After Veronika, Rasa and Ingrida prepared previous sessions, this time the book was chosen by another Book Club participant Hedvika. With Hedvika, we will get out to the frontiers of the latest thinking about love, language, family and queerness. Maggie Nelson’s The Argonauts, book that we are going to discuss, is a genre-bending memoir, offering fresh, fierce, and timely thinking about desire, identity, and the limitations and possibilities of love and language. At its center is a romance: Nelson’s falling in love with Dodge, who is fluidly gendered. Her journey to and through a pregnancy offers a firsthand account of the complexities and joys of (queer) family-making. You can find which part of the book to read for Book Club session in Facebook event.
Book Club is a personal project of LGL`s EVS volunteer from Slovakia, Veronika Štefečková. “I had the idea of sessions or lectures about connection of feminism, gender studies and LGBT* topics in my mind since I started my voluntary service in LGL in April 2016. It drives from my university background since I have studied gender studies and social anthropology and at the same time I was always interested in LGBT* topics. First session of what we have called Book Club took place in November 2016 with idea to use the winter season to spend long cold evenings with cup of tea reading some good book. It wouldn`t be possible without the support of many people who were encouraging me, specifically our volunteer coordinator Diana and at that time intern Ingrida. I am glad that it is already fifth session going to happen and I am gratefull to LGL that they offered this space for meeting people and discussing the topics we are interested in.”
Veronika`s voluntary service in LGL is coming to its end in April 2017, but that doesn`t mean that Book Club has to end, too. There is so many interesting topics and books to discuss! If you have a proposal for the book or if you are interested in introducing some new topic in the frame of Book Club, just drop an e-mail to veronika@gay.lt.
LGL is carrying out the 10-month project “Heading Towards Visibility and Equality” under the Erasmus+ program EVS (European Voluntary Service).
