Notes1 on "Between the Sheets, and In the Streets, Queer, Lesbian and Gay Documentary"

“Our project, once again, is one of suggestion, provocation, and encouragement, meant to remind ourselves and our readers how important it is to acknowledge and value the shifting layering of identity and community, even as we work toward what we feel is the crucial task of coalition building.” This phrase in the introduction to “between the sheets” drew me in immediately. I felt as I read this book that I was talking to friends about their experiences in making queer film. I could draw correlations between the filmmakers movies and my own.

In Chris Cagle’s essay “Imaging the Queer South” he states that, “Though it is posed as a national movement, “queer” frequently means specifically Northern and/or metropolitan, while Southern queers living in the South are viewed as an amorphous group of “Others.” I could easily see this happen between Eastern and Western European queers. As we filmed in the East we could see how the Western Europeans viewed the queer Eastern situation as tragic and went there to help as much as they could. While the Eastern European queers could see the Westerners as helpful but felt okay with the situation they had and wanted to do more organizing in the regions they lived in amongst themselves without using methods and ideas imported from the West.

Cagle uses the term “Gay and Lesbian affirmational documentary” to mean a “retroactive narrative of coming out and personal journeys as political testimony.” While editing Travel Queeries I am getting ideas for what language I want to use in discussing the film and the kind of documentary it is becoming. I see Travel Queeries as a combination of participatory and performative documentary. I appreciate reading descriptions about the choices filmmakers use to express the feelings they are trying to encourage their audiences to have. In “Greetings from Out Here” Ellen Spiro talks from an insider’s perspective on being queer in the south, Spiro lets herself become a part of the documentary by reconciling her past as a Southerner living in the North while at the same time documenting modern Southern queer culture. I look forward to more insider information and a larger perspective on what my documentary could represent as I continue to read these essays.