Welcome to The Queer Joy Project of East Texas!
Oral histories from LGBT+ East Texans.
Hello,
I started this project at the beginning of 2024 as a way to learn about the LGBT+ history of my hometown. Past documentation of Queer life in East Texas has mainly come from outside sources, focused on violence, and has failed to thoroughly capture the history of the area. Because of this, I have started having conversations with local Queers where I collect stories and pictures of their lives here in East Texas, as well as what Queer joy means to them.
-Carolina (She/Her)
East Texas:
Also known as “The Piney Woods”, East Texas includes the following counties and cities:
Methods:
Snowball Sampling: talking to friends and local connections, meeting with LGBT+ organizations, attending Queer events.
Photo Elicitation Interviews: 15-30 minute semi-structured recorded interviews (in-person, virtual, form submission) with questions on East Texas life, and what Queer joy means to them, along with them providing a picture that represents Queer joy to them.
Cleaning: Voice recordings of interviews are transcribed with Otter.ai and edited for posts.
Archiving: Each post included picture from participant, quotes from interview, and PDF transcript of full interview.
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