Sean’s Query: GIS for Queers
(this essay was written in 2020 by friend and colleague of many years, Sean Dunnington, (he, him) storyteller, playwright and LGBTQ+ activist. Like many activists, Sean uses the reclaimed term "queer" in talking about his community. )
Why should GIS matter to Queer People? For the last two decades, cartographers, geographers, and scholars have been exploring the semantics of queer geography, an integrative approach to queer theory and spatial analytics that examines the social relationships of sexuality, place, and space. I employ queer as an elastic term that includes all dissident sexualities and peoples, but I like to think of it as a ‘zone of possibilities’ that rejects binary definition and deconstructs heteronormative identities, practices, and knowledge.
