LGBTQIA+: Books & Media

Coming Out Republican by Neil J. Young A revelatory and comprehensive history of the gay Right from incisive political commentator Neil J. Young. One of the most maligned, misunderstood, and even mocked constituencies in American politics, gay Republicans regularly face condemnation from both the LGBTQ+ community and their own political party. Yet they've been active and influential for decades. Gay conservatives were instrumental, for example, in ending "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and securing the legalization of same-sex marriage--but they also helped lay the groundwork for the rise of Donald Trump. In Coming Out Republican, political historian and commentator Neil J. Young provides the first comprehensive history of the gay Right. From the 1950s up to the present day, Young excavates the multifarious origins, motivations, and evolutions of LGBTQ+ people who found their way to the institutions and networks of modern conservatism. Many on the gay Right have championed conservative values--like free markets, a strong national defense, and individual liberty--and believed that the Republican Party therefore offered LGBTQ+ people the best pathway to freedom. Meanwhile, that same party has actively and repeatedly demonized them. With his precise and provocative voice, Young details the complicated dynamics of being in--and yet never fully accepted into--the Republican Party. Coming Out Republican provides striking insight into who LGBTQ+ conservatives are, what they want, and why many of them continue to align with a party whose rank and file largely seem to hate them. As the Republican Party renews its assaults on LGBTQ+ rights, understanding the significant history of the gay Right has never been more critical.

Family Matters by Marie-Amélie George

How to Queer the World by Bo Ruberg What video games teach us about building a more inclusive world What does it mean to build a world? Worldbuilding is traditionally understood as an expression of storytelling across media forms. Yet, as video games show us, worldbuilding does not necessarily need to center narrative elements. Instead, new worlds can allow us to reimagine existing structures, conventions, and constants. Doing so gives us the tools to queer the world around us. How to Queer the World argues that video games provide us with keen insight into worldbuilding. With these insights come a new understanding of the ever-elusive ideals of queer worldmaking. Video games challenge us to address how worlds are built through underlying systems rather than surface-level representation. They also offer opportunities to envision alternate and queer ways of living, loving, desiring, and being. Each of the chapters in this book presents a close reading of a video game that illustrates one way of building worlds and encoding them with meaning, focusing on elements of digital media often overlooked as technical rather than cultural. From the design of game mechanics and user interfaces to the use of graphics software and physics simulations, Bo Ruberg argues that these aspects of video games represent a critical toolkit for seeing the work of worldbuilding differently--in video games and beyond. Simultaneously, each of these video games models an approach to what Ruberg terms "queer worldbuilding." Queer worldbuilding radically remakes the world by destabilizing the fundamental logics of our own universe: who we are, what we can do, how our bodies move, and how we exist within time and space.

Uniform Prejudice by Thomas C. Rust

The Gay Revolution by Lillian Faderman

Menace to the Future by Jess Whatcott

Mission Possible: The Story of Repealing Don't Ask, Don't Tell by C. Dixon Osburn

Pride: The Story of the LGBTQ Equality Movement by Matthew Todd

Transgender History, Second Edition by Susan Stryker

We Are Everywhere by Matthew Riemer; Leighton Brown