UCR Conference on Queer and Trans Studies in Religion
UCR Conference on Queer and Trans Studies in Religion
Queering the Academic Conference since 2019
UCR-QTSR VIII – February 13-15, 2026
Theme: Sanctuary and Struggle
We’re happy to welcome Evren Savci and Lamya H as our 2026 keynote speakers!
The UCR Conference on Queer and Trans Studies in Religion (UCR-QTSR) is proudly celebrating its eighth year as the leading international conference for scholars of queer and trans studies in religion. The conference is fully online this year and open to the public; registration is free but includes the option of paying up to $150 in registration fees, especially if you have institutional funding, to keep the conference going. Registration is required in advance. For more information, contact ucrqtsr@ucr.edu.
Program Schedule
All times are Pacific Standard Time (PST) - GMT-8
The conference is entirely online - please register to receive the zoom link
Friday, February 13, 2025
5:30 – 7:00 p.m. Keynote Address: Evren Savci
Saturday, February 14, 2025
8:30 – 10:00 a.m. New Directions in Trans and Queer Buddhist Studies
- “Trans Masculinities in the Court of the Empress Dowager Ling (6th c.)”
- “Queer Buddhist Activism: History, Present, and Future Directions
- “Five Years of International Queer Buddhist Conferences
- Sensual Materialities: Buddhist Art-Making and Bodily Ethics in Queer and Trans Bangkok”
10:15 – 11:30 a.m. QTSR Methods in South Asia
- “Sexting the Hindoo: Phrenology, Idolatry, and the Erotics of Colonial Knowledge in Nineteenth-Century India”
- “Exploring Gender Variance in the Early Modern Mughal Manuscript Hamzanama”
- “Drag the Classical: The Religious Possibilities of Incorporating Indian Classical/Folk Dance into Drag”
12:30 – 2:00 p.m. Temporality, Archive, and Death in Queer/Trans Religious Imaginations
- “Archival Potentials: Critical Fabulation among Queer and Trans AFAB Communities in Karachi, Pakistan”
- “Disagreement, Pain, and Competing Theories of Gender in Feminist and Trans Histories”
- “AIDS and the Priesthood of Tim Dlugos”
- “Temporality and Revelation in Queer Muslim Futurism”
2:15 – 3:30 p.m. Taking and Making Space: Queer Muslims in Ritual, Spirit, and Law
- “Making Space for Queer Muslims in Contemporary Islamic Jurisprudence”
- “Living Room Jamaats”
- “Living Again Through Spiritual Practice”
3:45 – 5:15 p.m. Trans Biblical and Beyond: Current Directions and Potential Futures for Trans Biblical Interpretation
5:30 – 7:00 p.m. Creative Keynote: Lamya H
Sunday, February 15, 2025
8:30 – 9:45 a.m. Queer and Trans Studies in Ministry: Praxeological and Autoethnographic Reflections
10:00 – 11:30 a.m. Creating a New Companion for LGBTIQ+ Biblical Interpretation: Reflection & Response
12:30 – 1:45 p.m. Palgrave Handbook in Queer & Trans Studies in Religion
2:00 – 3:15 p.m. Trans* Futures and Queer Pasts
- “Reimagining Gender: Esotericism, the Medieval Imagination, and the Proliferation of Identity”
- “Not without Consequence: Queer Casualties of History and Historiography”
3:30 – 5:00 p.m. Queer & Trans Embodiments
- “Queer Sensuality and the Sacred: Embodiment, Experience, and the Holy Spirit”
- "It All Boils Down to Water, But First, There Needs to Be a Boil: Queering the Body as a Technology of Transmission in Sacred Space"
- “Our Bodies Are the Site of Sanctuary and Struggle”
- “Bodies in Motion: Transition, Migration, and Solidarity Beyond Borders”