Welcome!

Being a loyal Chicagoan, when I first read the course title “American Queer”, my next immediate thought was of “Boystown”.

Boystown, located on Chicago’s North Side, was the first officially recognized LGBT community in the United States. A quick glance down Halsted Avenue (one of the main streets of Boystown) reveals just a glimpse of a place brimming with “gay pride”. In addition to the numerous displays of pride flags and even the pride pillars, the streets of Boystown boast numerous bars, clubs, upscale shops and even posters advertising everything from new book clubs, to discussion forums and even to which nightclub is hosting drag night.
However, even though I have lived in Chicago for the majority of my life and even more significantly, in the bordering community of Boystown, I have never actually went out and experienced Boystown. Hence the title of my blog “Walking in Boystown” is somewhat ironic since it relates to the fact that I have no previous knowledge of the history of the community, or even of the current issues within the community. Needless to say, it is definitely one of my goals of the class: to be able to get a good foothold on what’s going on.

So that is about it in terms of Intros… I have never actually created a blog (and have a hard time keeping journals-so I apologize if at times it seems too formal) but please feel free to comment, offer feedback etc!

Welcome again to Walking in Boystown !