World-Renowned LGBT Expert Coming to Auckland And Wellington

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

World-Renowned LGBT Expert Coming to Auckland And Wellington

The Holocaust Centre of New Zealand (HCNZ) is excited to welcome Professor William Spurlin, an international expert in LGBT culture and literature, including the treatment of gays and lesbians during the Holocaust, to speak at its second forum for discussion of Human Rights in Auckland and Wellington.

Professor Spurlin’s talk is titled The Pink Triangle - LGBT Rights from the Holocaust to Modern Day.

Professor Spurlin's interdisciplinary research encompasses the analysis of a broad range of literary, cultural, and critical texts spanning from the fin de siècle to the 20th and 21st centuries.

His major publications include Lost Intimacies: Rethinking Homosexuality Under National Socialism, and Comparatively Queer: Interrogating Identities Across Time and Cultures.

Lost Intimacies represents a significant addition to Holocaust studies in its reexamination of gender and sexuality in Nazi ideology and policies and the persecution of gays and lesbians.

Professor Spurlin has also contributed the chapter 'Queering Holocaust Studies: New Frameworks for Understanding Nazi Homophobia and the Politics of Sexuality under National Socialism,' in the Companion to the Holocaust (Wiley-Blackwell, forthcoming September 2019).

Professor Spurlin is currently completing a book on representations of sexual dissidence in new queer francophone life writing from the Maghreb. His comparative queer work has also contributed significantly to the development of queer translation studies as a recognised sphere of inquiry.

“The enduring lessons of the Holocaust concerning prejudice, hate speech and discrimination – and the need to consistently stand up to these – creates the foundation and framework for HCNZ’s broader entry into the social justice/human rights arena,” said Holocaust Centre CEO, Chris Harris. “We have an obligation, a moral duty to speak up for the oppressed, the disadvantaged and the vulnerable.”

The Forum for Discussion on Human Rights will also be livestreamed on the Holocaust Centre of New Zealand’s Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/HCNZWellington/

The Pink Triangle - LGBT Rights from the Holocaust to Modern Day
Dates & Venues:

6 - 7:30 pm, 25 June – Auckland: Room WA 224 A, Level 2, Sir Paul Reeves Building, AUT City Campus, 2 Governor Fitzroy Place

6 - 7:30pm, 27 June – Wellington: Auditorium, Lower Ground Floor, National Library of New Zealand, Cnr Aitken & Molesworth Streets
Admission: Free

About Professor William Spurlin: Professor Spurlin is currently Professor of English, Department of Arts and Humanities, Division of English and Creative Writing and Vice Dean/Education, College of Business, Arts & Social Sciences at Brunel University. Before Brunel, Spurlin was Professor of English at the University of Sussex, where he directed the Centre for the Study of Sexual Dissidence and Cultural Change for five years. He has also taught at Cardiff University, Columbia University, and Illinois State University.

Recently published by Professor Spurlin:
Professor Spurlin’s article 'Queer Theory and Biomedical Practice: The Biomedicalization of Sexuality/The Politics of Biomedicine' in the Journal of Medical Humanities (March 2019) 40.1: 7-20.
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10912-018-9526-0

See chapter 'Queering Translation: Rethinking Gender and Sexual Politics in the Spaces between Languages and Cultures' in Queer in Translation
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315603216

See Particle 'Contested Borders: Cultural Translation and Queer Politics in Contemporary Francophone Writing from the Maghreb' in the journal Research in African Literatures
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/622198

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