Events
Works in Progress
The Global Sexual and Gender Identities Policy Lab’s Works-in-progress series provides a forum for scholars to present their research at all stages of development, from early ideas for new projects to complete papers near to submission.
These seminars are open to LSE staff and students
Up coming events in the series will be added here in due course.
Works-in-progress series-26 November 2025
Tuna Ogut, Department of Geography and Environment, "Conceiving of access to politics in geographical terms: Infrastructures of trans people's organising".
Works-in-progress series-29 October 2025
Fuyun Wei, Visiting Research Student in Department of Sociology LSE and Zhejiang University, China, "Belonging before Justifying: Men’s Affective Attachments and Male Effeminacy in Feminized Fields".
Works-in-progress series- 15 November 2024
Dr Kevin Zapata-Celestino, "Living hell in paradise? LGBT experiences in the rural Caribbean".
MSc dissertation proposal roundtable- 7 February 2024
A free-form roundtable discussion with MSc students who are in the early stages of their dissertation research on issues relevant to sexuality and gender identity.
Works-in-progress series- 26 January 2024
Carlos Alberto ALZA, "Morality Politics and Policy Change in Latin America. The Case of Marriage Equality".
Works-in-progress series- 24 November 2023
Guodong Ju, "What LGBTQ+ discuss on Chinese social media: a structure topic model analysis from 2005-2022".
Works-in-progress series- 13 October 2023
Eliz Wong, "Family Dynamics and Parental Recognition in Same-sex Marriage Formation in Taipei and Hong Kong".
Works-in-progress series- 5 May 2023
Guodong Ju and Songyin Liu, "Making Sense of Queer Backwardness: A Structured Topic Analysis of Online Debates on Taiwan’s Gay Marriage Legislation on Zhihu".
Works-in-progress series- 31 March 2023
Joe Strong, "Sexuality and social control among men in Ghana".
Works-in-progress series- 3 March 2023
Eliz Wong, "The power and limits of same-sex marriage legislation on marital intention and experience: A comparative study of Chinese same-sex couples in Taipei and Hong Kong".
Seminars
Rainbow Trap: Diversity Policies, LGBTQ Categories and the Dangers of Inclusion
Presenter: Dr Kevin Guyan (University of Edinburgh)
Chair: Professor Hakan Seckinelgin (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Abstract: Kevin Guyan shares ideas from his new book Rainbow Trap: Queer Lives, Categories and the Dangers of Inclusion (Bloomsbury Academic, 2025). In this work, Guyan reveals how the fight for LGBTQ equalities is shaped – and constrained – by the classifications we encounter every day.
Rainbow Trap examines queer encounters with six different systems – stretching from diversity policies in the film and TV industries to the algorithms powering dating apps – and highlights how the promise of inclusion requires LGBTQ people to locate themselves in an ever-growing list of classifications, categories and labels.
This requirement to be classified catches LGBTQ communities in a rainbow trap. Because when we look beyond the welcoming veneer of inclusive interventions, we uncover sorting processes that determine what LGBTQ lives are valued and what queer futures are possible.
Presenter Bio: Dr Kevin Guyan is a Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of Edinburgh and Director of the Gender + Sexuality Data Lab. He is the author of Rainbow Trap: Queer Lives, Classifications and the Dangers of Inclusion (Bloomsbury Academic, 2025) and Queer Data: Using Gender, Sex and Sexuality Data for Action (Bloomsbury Academic, 2022).
Attend in person- OLD 2.21
Or register to attend online here.