B.Michael was invited to participate in the Panel on AIDS Service [sic] of the Sager Symposium at Swarthmore College, which took place in mid-April 1994.
He would have been invited in his capacity as board chair of Other Countries, which had recently released their journal, Sojourner: Black Gay Voices in the Age of AIDS. At the time, their volume was nominated for, and ended up receiving, a Lambda Literary Award. B.Michael’s intention in this conversation about coalitions, queerness and difference would have been to complexify the notion of what people, particularly Black gay men, living with or at risk for HIV/AIDS need with regard to “services,” and to elevate the role of art, storytelling, and bearing witness in the HIV movement.
The above poster (original 11″ x 17″) highlights a range of programming brought by a compelling roster of LGBTQI activists, most from the Northeast, including What I Miss? contributor Colin Robinson. The Symposium took place just 2.5 months ahead of the historic 25th Anniversary of the Stonewall Riots in New York City.