Queer as Method:
Transdisciplinary Approaches to Art, Research and Resistance
an online transdisciplinary conference
September 11-12, 2026
Online, Via Zoom
Proposal deadline: August 1, 2026
Fees:
£100 (for both presenters and attendees)
Prices exclude booking fees
What happens when we resist fixed boundaries, and what might it mean to queer the boundaries of research itself?
This transdisciplinary conference invites artists, academics, performers, writers, activists and practitioners to explore queer approaches to arts-based research across disciplines. We seek proposals that engage queer methodologies, lived experiences, practices, and aesthetics as ways of destabilising dominant modes of knowledge production and expression.
Queer theory challenges normative assumptions surrounding identity, embodiment, power, temporality, and labour. Building on the works of scholars such as Judith Butler, Jack Halberstam, Eve Sedgwick, Sara Ahmed and José Esteban Muñoz, this conference understands ‘queer’ as critical and creative method, rather than as solely referring to the expression of sexuality. In this sense, queerness is something that is inherently political: it resists fixed categories, and questions cultural assumptions built on the interlocking structures of heteropatriarchy, white supremacy, and settler colonialism. Through this disruption, the application of queer as method allows for the imagining of alternative ways of making, knowing, and being in the world.
We welcome submissions from across disciplines and encourage experimental, practice-based and non-traditional formats. All presentation formats are welcomed, including collaborative and multi-author submissions.
Note: This conference aims to celebrate queer lives, art, and research: this is not a forum to discuss the validity of queer sexualities and trans lives. We hold a zero-tolerance policy for transphobia, homophobia, sexism, racism, classism, ableism, and hatred in all its forms.
If you have any accessibility requirements at all, please do make a note of these in your proposal.
Suggested topics include (but are not limited to!):
- Queer histories, archives, and memory
- Queer literature, film, art, music, media, and popular culture
- Gender identity, sexuality, and artistic practice
- Kinship, chosen family, childhood and community
- Intersectional approaches: queerness in relation to race, class, and disability studies
- Diaspora, migration, colonialism and decolonial approaches
- Queer joy, care, and resilience
- Moral panic, media representation, and the politics of visibility
- Protest, activism, and social movements
- Medicalisation, pathologisation, and the politics of the queer body
- Queer and feminist approaches to science, technology, and knowledge production
- Queer temporalities, futures, and speculative approaches
- Queer approaches to ecology and the natural world
- Hybrid, experimental, and transdisciplinary practices
- Drag, cabaret, burlesque, performance, and nightlife cultures
- Media, representation, and digital cultures
- Zines, DIY publishing, and queer print cultures
- Fashion, costume, embodiment, and visual culture
- Queer aesthetics and creative practice
The full conference programme will be announced following the proposal deadline, once all presenters have been selected.
Note: Participants interested in attending the conference without presenting a paper are also welcome.
Submission Guidelines: Please fill out this proposal form by August 1, 2026: https://forms.gle/w6k6obeiQeAZf2wUA
Contact Information: For inquiries or clarifications, please email us at conferences@labrc.co.uk
Conference chair: Arden Waterman
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