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The Story
Tongues
began and developed with the leadership that reflects its target population. The
current leadership of Tongues has been active in the Los Angeles area since
October 1999 and grew out of an initial interest to create a politically and
socially conscious magazine and website 'zine for Queer women of color,
specifically Xicanas/Latinas. Realizing that many of the Los Angeles-area
agencies dealing with Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender issues lacked in
providing a creative and political arena for the development of Queer Latina
expression, leadership and community, Tongues has evolved into serving as a
medium for creating said platform to dialogue and take proactive measures on a
variety of issues that usually are not considered "relevant" to Queer Latinas
(i.e. globalization, worker's rights, and educational justice). There is also a
need to heighten dialogue on the dynamics of race, class and gender so that
local LGBT and/or Latina/o organizations can engage and become better equipped
to meet the needs of their Queer Latina constituents.
Much of Tongues' organizing has been concentrated in the East Los Angeles, Hollywood, Silverlake, and West Los Angeles/Santa Monica areas. Thus far, events have ranged from poetry readings and art shows to workshops on countering homophobia and safer sex discussions with an emphasis on HIV/AIDS prevention for Queer Latina youth. These organizing efforts have been recognized and requested by established Queer Latino/a-focused community-based organizations such as Bienestar, Altamed, LG PLAN (Lesbian and Gay Professional Latina/o Access Network) and VIVA.
The
recent growth of Tongues, in its present formation, truly began and developed in
the fall of 2000. The organization VIVA, founded in 1988, offered to turn over
its resources and non-profit status to Tongues. VIVA has been a trailblazing
force in the discovery, promotion and documentation of Queer Latina/o artists.
They have provided visibility to Queer Latino/as who have historically not been
afforded such opportunities due to censorship--both societal and institutional.
VIVA's then remaining Board members relinquished their duties and authorized
their mission statement, office space and non-profit status to be operated under
Tongues' leadership and now are members of Tongues' Community Advisory Board.
Tongues is now in the process of amending VIVA's bi-laws and constitution, and
plans formally announce the transition to community members at large in the
summer of 2001. Until then, Tongues is technically known as "Tongues, a project
of VIVA."
As a result of this transition, Tongues has been given a unique opportunity to bridge the gap between younger and older Queer Latina/os. Tongues recognizes and is inspired by the urgency of connecting younger Queer Latinas with the network of the older and established generation, who can offer wise counsel through mentorship.
Our Mission
Tongues is a non-profit collective of Queer Latinas organizing towards building a movement that inspires new conceptualizations of identity, motivates cross-collaborations, provides an outlet, and addresses social issues across the LGBT and Latina/o communities.
While in the hopes of reconstructing a language of our own, we use the word "Queer" to connote the range of identifiers with which we currently engage ourselves to include lesbian, bisexual, same-gender loving, gay, two-spirited, jota, dyke, etc. We choose "Tongues" as a symbol of our rhythmic instrument on which we depend to communicate our realities and unleash our desires; give voice to the traditionally silent, and epitomize our sensuality; mobilize our communities, and make and share erotic pleasure.
Submission Guidelines
Tongues invites all Queer women of color to consider this their space and to feel free to submit materials that are reflective of your experiences as Queer women of color. We welcome all work that is political, cultural, artistic, visual (i.e. photography) poetry, short stories, prose, interviews, testimonials and scholarly work. We accept submissions year round but this site does have quarterly publication cycles. The editors of Tongues reserve the right to decide when accepted submissions will be either uploaded on the website or published in the print version of Tongues. The author/artists will retain all rights to their work and can submit their work to other venues simultaneously. Submission of your work does not guarantee its acceptance. Acceptance depends on the current needs of the web-zine/magazine.
In order to be considered you must do the following:
- All short stories, prose, essays, fiction, testimonials, etc. must be limited to 2,000 words.
- All work must be within one attached document. Formatted as either Microsoft Word (.doc) or Word perfect format (.wpd) or they will not be read.
- We encourage work in either English or Spanish, however we will not provide any translations.
- Work should be well edited and ready to be uploaded.
- If submitting poetry, please only send us three poems per submission.
- Visual artists can submit up to 10 images per submission. Please send all files in (.jpg) format.
- ALL WORK, LITERARY OR VISUAL SHOUL BE ACCOMPANIED BY A 3SENTENCE BIO ON THE ARTIST.
- Lastly, we are a volunteer-based organization so PLEASE give us a month to get back to you on your submission before sending queries. But if you do not hear from us by the deadline for the next web-zine issue, feel free to e-mail us asking about the status of your work.
© 2009 Tongues Magazine
