Excited to launch the second series of Queer & A podcast. Queer & A podcast is a community-oriented educational project aimed at bringing awareness about, and sharing resources to combat, religiously-motivated queerphobia and transphobia.

In Series 1 I interviewed a combination of academics, activists, therapists, and individuals with personal experiences to share from, and we conversed widely about the history and present day experiences of homophobia and the role that religion plays in it.

I loved those conversations. And yet, somewhere in the midst of talking about religion and queerness, I realized something: I didn't only want Queer & A to talk about this topic, I wanted Queer &A's engagement to not only be intellectual but to be creative.

Slowly but surely, the concept of Queer & A sponsoring artists in a virtual artist residency program took shape. Through financially supporting artists in a virtual residency atmosphere, artists spent 8 weeks creating art on the topic of Queerness and Spirituality—broadly defined

In this round of the virtual artist residency, Queer & A was joined by two artists: Naledi Sunstrum and Charley Bouchard. Charley and Naledi joined me in weekly virtual meetings as they worked on their individual artistic projects. Each week, the artists shared updates on their respective projects as they advanced in them. Charley was working on a play and Naledi was working on two songs.In this episode, you’ll meet the artists, hear a little bit about their respective artistic projects, and you’ll also get introduced to the broader themes that the remainder of this Series 2 podcast is going to explore. I’m a qualitative researcher at heart, and I couldn’t help but notice that, in each week we met, I was not only hearing chronological updates about the artists’ projects. Rather, we were also talking broadly about themes related to artistic creation. We talked about writer’s block. What it’s like to collaborate with others. The feeling of sharing your work in progress and the vulnerability that comes with that. How to know when a project is finished — and much moreI began to realize these themes didn’t only apply to the process of creating art—they’re themes that all of us experience throughout our personal lives, work tasks, etc. So in this series, we’re going to explore those themes broadly AND follow along with the artists’ journeys.I cannot wait to share more! Please subscribe to get notified as new episodes release—I’ll aim for 1X a month. And share this podcast with a friend who you think may find the content intriguing.

Permissions:The instrumental of the song “Bones” by OKNaledi is used with permission in the Intro and Outro of this podcast. Check out the full version here. Learn more about OkNaledi’s music by checking out their instagram.

Clips from “Reggae is the Answer (Instrumental)” and “Never be the same again (instrumental)” were freely sourced through my paid membership to Descript platform. They are used throughout the show when Charley and Naledi speak about their work.

Get full access to Queer & A - 2SLGBTQIA+ and religious homophobia at nadyapohran.substack.com/subscribe