Student-led Network: LGBTQ+ Researcher Network

Who is the LGBTQ+ Network for?

The LGBTQ+ Researcher Network is a safe/r space for LGBTQ+ researchers and, or, those researching LGBTQ+ communities, to find support, connection and community.
LGBTQ+ communities are significantly affected by trans, bi and homophobia and research around these issues can be complex and challenging. This is particularly acute around trans issues and around research related to children and to schools, creating stress for the researchers, particularly those who identify as LGBTQ+.
*I am particularly aware of the recent Supreme Court ruling and subsequent EHRC guidance and the severe impact this is having on trans, non-binary and gender diverse people at the moment. This is a trans positive space. If you have any concerns about attending, please get in touch*

Where and when do we meet?

We will meet monthly online using MS Teams to share current thinking, ideas and research, and also host speakers who identify as LGBTQ+ and, or research LGBTQ+ communities. This is a relaxed, informal place so please come as you are and with your camera on. This is not only for connection purposes, but for safety so we know who is in the meeting.

What will the LGBTQ+ Network do?

We will meet informally online every other month to share our thinking, feeling, ideas and research. Alternate to these meet ups, guest speakers (academic and community) will be invited to deliver a short online presentation on their research or deliver a talk that would advance the knowledge and experience of the people belonging to the network who identify as LGBTQ+ and, or those who research LGBTQ+ communities. After the presentation, there will be time for reflections and questions.
There will be 6 speakers in total over 1 year, with an option for further speakers based at WRDTP partner universities throughout this time. Those belonging to the network are involved in co-creating plans for speakers or might choose to contribute ideas as to what they want to learn more about regarding to their PhD focus, needs and interests.
If this is a space you feel you would like to be part of, please contact Mel Riley (MELANIE.SAYERS@stu.mmu.ac.uk).

Upcoming Events:

Please contact Mel (MELANIE.SAYERS@stu.mmu.ac.uk) or the WRDTP team (training@wrdtp.ac.uk) to receive the joining link/s for any of the following sessions. Look out for more information on this page and in our monthly Training and Events Round-Ups.

The next meetings will be:

  • Thursday 26th November 2026 (10:00-11:30) – Online: Prof Churnjeet Mahn will be our guest speaker to discuss their book “Desi Queers: LGBTQ+ South Asians and Cultural Belonging in Britain”;
  • Tuesday 1st December 2026 (10:00-11:00) – Online: Monthly informal meet-up;
  • Friday 11th December 2026 (11:00-12:30) – Online: Prof Yvette Taylor will be our guest speaker. Please see the synopsis for Yvette’s talk below:
Drawing on Chapter 2, ‘(Un)Doing Queer-Class Data’, of Working-Class Queers: Time, Place and Politics (Pluto Press, 2023), this talk explores the challenges and possibilities of researching class and sexuality together. Across more than two decades of UK-based research, I have returned to questions of who becomes visible within queer research, whose experiences are recognised, and how working-class queer lives are represented, categorised and sometimes excluded. What does it mean to ‘be’ data, as well as to ‘do’ data? How do research encounters, institutional expectations and established categories shape what can be said, heard and known about queer-class lives?
Rather than treating class as an additional identity category, the chapter considers how class and sexuality are lived, negotiated and produced through research itself. It asks how dominant approaches to queer inclusion can reproduce middle-class assumptions, leaving working-class experiences marginal to both queer studies and accounts of class inequality. Bringing these methodological and political questions into conversation, the talk considers how we might rethink the relationship between researchers, participants and the data we produce. It invites reflection on the possibilities of queer-class research as a practice of continually redoing, rewriting and rethinking, and on how research might better attend to experiences that challenge its established categories and conventions.
The session will open up discussion about researching class and sexuality, negotiating our own positions as researchers, and the possibilities for more reflexive, accountable and politically engaged LGBTQ+ scholarship.

Past Events:

Over this past year, we have enjoyed getting to know each other through our informal meet ups and have enjoyed a variety of presentations.
Below is a list of the presentations we have had:
  • Jayne Mugglestone, MMU, “Queer Spaces! – reflections on my current Doctoral Research”.
  • Dr. Lois Ferguson, The Kite Trust, “Compulsory guardian consent in LGBTQ+ youth research: more harm than good?”
  • Dr. Lena Mattheis, University of Surrey, “Gender nonconformity pronouns in literature”
  • Dr. Surabhi Shukla, University of Sheffield, “Experiences of Gender Non-conforming Students in Indian Schools”
  • Dr. Rachel Hann, Northumbria University, “Trans vibes?: a fluffy theory of transness beyond identity”
  • “Queers For Years”, Film Screening and panel discussion, September 2026