South Asia Citizens Web | 15 September 2003
Call for contributions to the "LARZISH-International film festival of sexuality and gender pluralities" festival catalogue and SCRIPTS, the queer zine by Lesbians and Bisexuals in Action (LABIA, formerly Stree Sangam).
Dear Friends,
You may have received an e-mail from us before about a call for queer literature and visual art works for the LARZISH film festival catalogue. We are overwhelmed with responses, submissions and queries within a very short time. Thanks to all of you who have submitted work, shown interest and circulated this e-mail widely.
In the light of such response and further work that we have been doing, we have streamlined this effort a bit more, organised ourselves and are resending this call for entries with more information which should answer most queries that we have been receiving.
But before that, we are delighted to tell you that LABIA: Lesbians And Bisexuals In Action (formerly known as Stree Sangam ñ yes, we have reinvented ourselves and emerged from the silence that we had gone into!) is compiling, editing and producing the literary and visual arts pan-queer international issue of "Scripts" (the magazine which had first made its appearance in 1998).
LARZISH and LABIA have decided to join their publication efforts to bring together the festival catalogue and the zine, quite literally. This means that the publication now will have two clear sections split in the middle. The first half will be the zine "Scripts" and the second half, the festival catalogue.
We have a small editorial team, which absolutely refuses to edit any of your submissions. We are here only to make sure that a variety of issues, genres, styles and outrageousness are represented in this issue.
CONTENT: QUEER, GAY, LESBIAN, TRANSGENDER, BISEXUAL, BENT, DEVIANT, KOTHI, EUNUCH, HIJRA, PANTHI, QUEENS, DRAG KINGS.
Everybody is welcome to submit their work. You don't have to identify in any pigeon-holed category. Only the work needs to reflect any of these sensibilities!
Guidelines for Submissions
For Literary submissions: Poetry, prose, essays, scribbles, fiction ó all are welcome. Submissions must be sent by email as text, or as word document attachments. We welcome hand written works to be directly submitted as such. You can send us hand-written documents by post mail or scan them and send them to us as TIFF files. Submissions must not exceed 600 words.
*We are especially seeking literary contributions in Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Gujarati, Urdu or any other regional languages. Works will be printed in their original language. Where ever possible please send us an English translation transcript along, especially if you would like it printed along with the original language piece.
*Safety. Many people may not feel comfortable or safe publishing their writings under their names. If you so wish we will be willing to publish your work under your pseudonym as well. If there are any other precautions that you would like us to take, kindly alert us of the same.
For Visual arts submissions: Photographs, sketches, drawings, paintings, doodles ó are all welcome. Kindly send us your work scanned as TIFF files in high resolution by e-mail, burnt on CD-R's, as Xeroxes or copies by post-mail. PLEASE DO NOT SEND ORIGINAL ARTWORKS.
*Safety. Again please specify under which name the artworks should be printed.
What other info do we need from you?
*Kindly send in your submissions clearly marked with the name of the writer/artist.
In case of Visual arts submissions, we encourage you to send a brief write up along with the work if you would like to give it some background.
*Do send us a very brief 2 line Bio which we can publish at the end of the book as a note on contributors. Again, if for issues of anonymity and safely you chose not to send this to us, we will understand.
*Some kind of postal address so we can send you a copy of the printed zine.
What we can do in return for your precious contributions?
*We are having an on-line edition of the zine which will be linked to the festival web-site.
*Copyright for all accepted contributions will remain with the authors. We do not reserve any right to place any of the accepted material for any other publication without the prior written permission of the authors/artists.
*Accepted submissions will not be paid for, but all contributors are guaranteed a wide motley readership. "Scripts" will be published in print and will also be uploaded in a pdf form on to the Larzish website. All contributors whose work has been accepted for publication will receive ONE free copy of the zine+festival catalogue.
Where and When to send your Contributions:
Last date for submission: 20th September, 2003
Please send all material to:
festival_humjinsi@hotmail.com
ts@vsnl.net
chayshal@vsnl.com
Post-mail:
Humjinsi,
C/O India Centre for Human Rights and Law
CVOD Jain High School
4th Floor, 84 Samuel Street (Hazrat Abbas St.)
Dongri, Bombay-9
India
Tel: +91-22-2371 6690
Fax:+91-22-2379 1099
ëLarzish, An International Film Festival of Sexualilty and Gender Pluralities' is being held in Bombay, India from the 17th ó 19th October 2003. The festival is being organised by Humjinsi, a lesbian and bisexual womenís group that is a part of India Centre for Human Rights and Law. Thematic packages at the festival include those addressing youth, child sexuality, womenís issues, sex workers rights, intersex recognition, masculinity, campy piss-takes on mainstream media, autobiographical sketches of transgender and transsexuals, anti-globalization resistance, and loads of fun and fiction of lesbian, gay, bisexual and bent themes.
Lesbians and Bisexuals in Action (LABIA), formerly known as Stree Sangam, is an autonomous, non-funded lesbian and bisexual womenís collective that has been in existence in Bombay since 1995. Stree Sangam activities have included networking with individual queer women as well as queer groups in India and in other countries, campaigning for the rights of peoples and communities of marginalised genders and sexualities with other like minded groups, and organising jointly with the struggles of other marginalised groups and peopleís movements. LABIA intends to further this activism and sees this issue of SCRIPTS as a vibrant space for multiple conversations of queer voices.
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