(image courtesy Housing Works / Housing Works History)
As a New York City resident, you’ve probably heard of Housing Works, whether through its bookstore, café, or one of its many thrift shops. Hopefully you’ve learned that the nonprofit is primarily dedicated to fighting AIDs and homelessness, but you might not know exactly how, for how long, or who has been involved. Tonight is your chance to find out.
At the Housing Works Bookstore Cafe, Gavin Browning, the director of Public Programs and Engagement at Columbia University School of the Arts, will present his impressive online project Housing Works History, which gives a detailed timeline of the organization from its inception in 1990 to the present. Through films, posters, architectural drawings, an interactive map, and more, Browning will illustrate the indelible mark Housing Works continues to make on the city through its advocacy work in housing and support for those living with HIV/AIDS. To distill this in numbers, Browning states, “The organization built over 200 units of permanent and transitional housing and served over 20,000 people by 2015.” Valerie Reyes-Jimenez, an AIDS activist, longterm HIV survivor, and New York City organizer at Housing Works Inc., will also join Browning in this necessary and surely illuminating talk.
You’ll also have the opportunity to learn about the NYC Trans Oral History Project, a collaboration between a local collective and the New York Public Library. Two of the organizers, Jeanne Vaccaro and Michelle O’Brien, will present on the project, which has been collecting, recording, and transcribing stories of transgender and gender nonconforming communities in the city. According to the website, which already has plenty of audio available, the goal has been specifically to “record diverse histories of gender as intersecting with race and racism, poverty, dis/ability, aging, housing migration, sexism, and the AIDS crisis.” Tanya Walker, cofounder of the New York Transgender Advocacy Group, trans outreach specialist at Choices Medical Center, and Audre Lorde Project board member, will also speak from her own experiences.
To round out the event, these various speakers of distinct backgrounds with common causes will engage in a conversation moderated by Housing Works Director of Advocacy Communications, Elizabeth Koke.
Where: Housing Works Bookstore Café (126 Crosby Street, Soho, Manhattan)
When: Tuesday, June 20, 7–8:30pm
More info here.
