Diego Semerene: Contemporary Queer Film's Aquatic Metaphors

In this lecture, Prof. Diego Semerene (Brown University) proposes a critical reading of the material, psychic and erotic function of water in the age of thalassopolitics through queer films such as Stranger by the Lake, Being 17 and Moonlight. Outlining a queer theory of cinematic water, Semerene argues the poetic necessity of aquatic risk and the ocean as our most urgent geo-political symptom. What is the allegorical function of water, in queer cinema specifically, at a time when data is coded to flow smoothly to their destination and migrant boats predestined to capsize?

This event is free and open to the public.