What I offer:

• Talks and workshops across a range of LGBTQIA+ history and culture.
• Diversity and inclusion across LGBTQIA+ identities, neurodiversity, and disability.
• Creative writing workshops with a specialism in writing for performance and arts criticism.

I’m available for various talks drawing on my expertise as an author of six books on Queer culture.

These talks can be mixed and matched to best suit your specific needs, and they can all be scaled and personalised based on the age and interests of your particular audience. I work remotely and in person, and I’m always happy to collaborate with you to design a talk or training tailored to your needs.

Recent clients include Taylor Wessing, Dominion Energy, and Birmingham Adult Education Services.

LGBTQIA+ History and Culture

Workshops covering a range of LGBTQ+ history and culture are perfect for LGBTQ+ History Month, Pride Month, or diversity and inclusion days.

A generalist introduction that covers the basics of LGBTQIA+ history and culture is available in 2-hour or half-day options.

Queer Art as Activism.

A deeper dive into Queer writing, performance and art aligned with politics and activism, from early protests and art through to the AIDS crisis and campaigns for equal marriage. Designed in equal parts as a talk on activism and art, it covers a century of Queer art and Activism.

More specialist workshops for those interested in a fuller investment or deeper dive into LGBTQIA+ culture:

Queer Theatre

The theatre has long been a place of acceptance and expression for LGBTQ+ people.

The theatre has long been a place of acceptance and expression for LGBTQ+ people.
This course examines the history of LGBTQ+ stories on stage and the theatre-makers behind them. Together, we will chart a history of British and American LGBTQ+ theatre, from the ‘hidden histories’ and stories of the past to the key plays that shape our LGBTQ+ stories on stage. This course gives an overview of how theatre helped tell the stories of a community from exclusion to liberation to the present day.

Companion workshops available.

Writing Queer Theatre

Using the groundwork of Queer Theatre history, how to get started on writing your own Queer theatre piece.

Queer Musical Theatre

Musical theatre has often been associated with high camp, but there’s a long history of Queer representation too. In this course, we will look at older works, such as Cabaret and the show’s troubled history of Queer representation, classics like La Cage Aux Folles, and contemporary works, including The Prom.

This course will look at stage and screen, controversy and representation, as well as consider the serious activist side of Queer musical theatre.

LGBTQIA+ TV- and why it matters!

A look at LGBTQIA+ contributions to TV- from the camp comedy characters of the 70s to Queer as Folk through to Heartstopper. This workshop is great for engaging audiences with LGBTQIA+ culture and history through a shared love of all things TV.

LGBTQIA+ Literature

Part historical overview and part literary analysis, this course will examine LGBTQ+ literature through the decades. Beginning with “hidden histories” of queer literature forced to hide its identity through the liberation era, the response to the devastation from Aids, and ending with contemporary works, this course will consider extracts from key works of LGBTQ+ literature, offer a discussion of the work and contextualise it alongside the history of the community, and author biographies.

This can be run as a one-off talk or a series of 6 weekly workshops.

Cultural History of AIDS

Using the framework of activism and mourning, this half-day course will look at how the Queer community responded to the Aids pandemic. Examining performance activism through history, we will study the ACT UP protest and the AIDS quilt.

We will move to theatrical responses, including memorials, fundraisers, and other channels for grief. Finally, we will look at film and television responses, from Philadelphia to It’s a Sin, and how the community has reclaimed the telling of its own stories.

Fanfiction Queer Narratives, Queer Communities

An online course diving into fanfiction and what it means to queer communities, looking at the history and origins of the format and different incarnations across the decades.

We will reflect on the different styles of writing, the shows that have meant the most to queer communities and how the act of reclaiming narratives in queer formats offered representation before there was any on TV.