Week 13 Quiana Rodriguez

Within the beginning of book, “Queer Nightlife” there is a breakdown about the planning, the formation of making space, and the outcomes of creating an inclusive space where queer nightlife is able to provide a space for members to be themselves. From the start of the book I found it interesting to learn about the ways in which expression through materialistic items lead to a form of going against the status quo or used as a tool to stand for oneself. Oftentimes in society perception is connected to ideologies, and intentional ways to express oneself openly as queer is a statement to claim space and embrace oneself. While there is a progressive movement that works to use fashion as a way to express oneself there are constraints that are explored within the reading. The book puts an emphasis on the planning that it takes to create spaces or movements of expression within the LGBTQ community as there is a conscious need to think about the safety of the people. It works to discuss the ways that some spaces are not as inclusive to the BIPOC community which relates to the two previous readings in class. I connect this to the other readings as the book shows how intersectional identities are a struggle to represent equally in some spaces. This connects to the socio-economic status and setting of queer nightlife spaces which can contribute to the high cost in events or lack of accessibility for community members that may have limited income. A quote that stood out to me was: “Indeed, queer nightlife venues have often been the target of police raids meant to manage aberrant bodies and desires, and gentrification efforts meant to ‘clean up’ neighborhoods  to make way for allegedly normative people and revenue streams” (5). This is important to understand as there is an interesting dynamic within law enforcement and queer spaces as we have seen within this reading and in the documentary that discusses housing displacement and claiming space. Overall, there are nuances when discussing the claiming of spaces and the usage of law enforcement as they have a history of discriminatory treatments to some identity groups that at times put their life in danger.