Book Talk: The Queer Arab Glossary

a book talk with Marwan Kaabour & Hamed Sinno 

Tuesday, October 1, 2024, 6:30 to 8 pm

20 Cooper Square, 3rd fl lobby

Please join the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality, Marwan Kaabour, and Hamed Sinno for a book launch and discussion of Kaabour's, The Queer Arab Glossary, where it will be available for purchase.

When conventional language does not equip us with the tools to speak about ourselves, we create our own. Slang expresses words and feelings that break down boundaries. It is a form of protest and fills in the gaps.

The Queer Arab Glossary is the first published collection of Arabic LGBTQ+ slang. This bold guide captures the lexicon of the queer Arab community in all its differences, quirks and felicities. Featuring fascinating facts and anecdotes, it contains more than 300 terms in both English and Arabic, ranging from the humorous to the harrowing, serious to tongue-in-cheek, pejorative to endearing. Here, leading queer Arab artists, academics, activists and writers offer insightful essays situating this groundbreaking glossary in a modern social and political context.

With beautiful, witty illustrations, The Queer Arab Glossary is a powerful response to pervasive myths and stereotypes around sexuality and an invitation to take a journey into queerness throughout the Arab world.

Contributors include Saqer Almarri, Nisrine Chaer, Sophie Chamas, Rana Issa, Adam HajYahia, Suneela Mubayi, Mejdulene Bernard Shomali, Hamed Sinno and Abdellah Taïa.

Marwan Kaabour is a graphic designer, artist and writer. His interdisciplinary practice builds pathways between communication and publication design, curation, pedagogy and political activism. Alongside his independent projects, he works with non-profit institutions, companies and individuals in arts and culture sectors. In 2019, Marwan founded Takweer, an online platform and expanding archive of queer narratives in Arab history and popular culture. His debut book, The Queer Arab Glossary, was published in June 2024.

Marwan moved from his hometown Beirut to London in 2011 to pursue a master's degree in Graphic Design from the London College of Communication, before joining renowned design agency Barnbrook. After more than six years of diverse experience with Barnbrook, first as Designer and later as Senior Designer, he founded his own studio in 2020.

His commissioned design work spans visual identities, publication and exhibition design, marketing campaigns, wayfinding systems and art direction, among others. He has worked with leading cultural institutions, including the V&A Museum, Phaidon, Art Basel, The National Gallery, Thames & Hudson, Serpentine Galleries, Hayward Gallery, Zaha Hadid Foundation and The Mosaic Rooms. He designed the Rihanna book, which was named as one of Time magazine's best photo books of 2019.

Hamed Sinno is a composer, writer, performer, and social justice advocate based in New York. They have been the lyricist and front-person for Mashrou Leila since 2008, engaging conversations around representation, free speech, gender justice, and sexual freedoms in the Middle East. H has a BFA from the Department of Architecture and Design at the American University of Beirut, and an MA in Digital Musics from Dartmouth College where they analyzed the vocal organ and digital vocality as sites of political negotiation. Their debut full-length opera, Westerly Breath, was in development at The Industry Los Angeles, and opened at the New York Met Museum in January 2024. Westerly Breath braids Egyptian mythology, and architectural history into a semi-autobiographical portrait of queer trauma, looking at dismemberment and remembrance across the vectors of myth, monument, and memoir. Their solo debut, Poems of Consumption, opened at London’s Barbican Centre in July 2023, and examined the overlaps of consumerism, mental illness, and environmental crisis through audiovisual accompaniment to poetry written in Amazon Product Reviews.