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The Queer Issue VII

June 2016

June-2016-Queer-Zanele-Muholi-Zinzi-and-Tozama-II-Mowbray-Cape-Town
Zanele Muholi, "Zinzi and Tozama II Mowbray, Cape Town," from the series Being, 2010. Gelatin Silver Print. © Zanele Muholi. Courtesy of the artist and Yancey Richardson Gallery.

Image: Zanele Muholi, “Zinzi and Tozama II Mowbray, Cape Town,” from the series Being, 2010. Gelatin Silver Print. © Zanele Muholi. Courtesy of the artist and Yancey Richardson Gallery.


This month we present the seventh installment of our annual Queer Issue. From the turbulence of adolescence to the resignation of middle age, in prison cells and open relationships, characters navigate queer desire and social constructs around the world. Jeon Sam-hye’s smitten space trainee moons over her superstar roommate. In São Paulo, Alexandre Vidal Porto’s straitlaced husband and father turns a cab into a confessional. Khadi Hane’s broken ex-convict remains captive to the past. Mu Cao’s runaway turned hustler finds sanctuary with an older man. In an excerpt from the first lesbian novel in Arabic, Lebanon’s Elham Mansour articulates a philosophy of love. Ronald M. Schernikau follows an infatuated teen on a school trip with his unwitting crush. And in two views of (and from) ménages à trois, Gabriela Wiener’s compulsive cheat finds it takes three to tango, and Lawrence Schimel’s serene polyamorist spreads the word and opens his arms.

In Praise of Nonconformity: The Queer Issue
By Susan Harris
Behind the bigotry and hyperbole lurk the fear of the unknown, the threat to the status quo.
Genesis
By Jeon Sam-hye
Because what you felt when he turned you down was how I felt whenever I looked at you.
Translated from Korean by Anton Hur
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Car Accident without Victims
By Alexandre Vidal Porto
At home, no one suspects I do this. Imagine. It’d destroy my marriage.
Translated from Portuguese by Alison Entrekin
Tomorrow, God Willing
By Khadi Hane
“Everyone’s queer in this bloody prison!”
Translated from French by Lulu Norman
Outcast
By Mu Cao
I suddenly realized that he was wearing a wig and the skin beneath his clothing was as coarse as tree bark.
Translated from Chinese by Scott E. Myers