Historic Joy Kogawa House will be hosting QueerAsian, a series of writing and creation workshops for LGBTQI+ Asians, focused on anti-Asian racism during the pandemic.

Led by queer Asian/Filipinx author C.E. Gatchalian, these workshops offer a safe space for people of Asian descent who identify as LGBTQI+ to discuss how the pandemic, the racism unleashed by the pandemic, and the world events of the past number of months (i.e., Black Lives Matter) have directly affected them. Gatchalian will offer guidance on how to engage in writing and artistic creation as a means of holding space for complex feelings. All workshops will take place on Zoom.

An outcome of the workshops will be a public sharing of work created by the participants (should the participants choose to share their work) to take place as both a public presentation on Zoom and as an archive to be launched on the Historic Joy Kogawa House website (kogawahouse.com).

All participants will be paid an honorarium ($100).

Asian/Filipinx author C.E. Gatchalian, our virtual Writer-in-Residence

Dates and times of the 6 workshops are as follows:

  • Thursday, December 3, 2020, 6 pm to 7:30 pm
  • Thursday, December 10, 2020, 6 pm to 7:30 pm
  • Thursday, December 17, 2020, 6 pm to 7:30 pm
  • Thursday, January 7, 2021, 6 pm to 7:30 pm
  • Thursday, January 14, 2021, 6 pm to 7:30 pm
  • Thursday, January 21, 2021, 6 pm to 7:30 pm

To register, email info@kogawahouse.com. We will send back a short application with short-answer questions about yourself, any experience of racism during the pandemic that you’d like to share, and information about your preferred form of creative expression.

These workshops are open to anyone who identifies their ancestral background as chiefly from any country or culture that is considered part of Asia (please see Merriam-Webster definition of “Asia”).

QueerAsian writing and creation workshops are brought to you in partnership with Asian Canadian Writers Workshop, BC Arts Council, Community Counts Foundation, and The McGrane-Pearson Endowment Fund.