LGBTQ+ youth writers get publication and mentorship opportunities through new Ypsi workshop series

This fall, Ypsilanti-based art center Dzanc House will add a new student-led writing workshop series for LGBTQ+ youth to its lineup of free writing, arts, and publishing workshops for young people. The series, entitled “Beyond the Binary: Stories That Shift Culture,” will include multiple opportunities for young participants’ work to be published and read in public forums.

Dzanc House, an extension of the Ann Arbor-based nonprofit independent publisher Dzanc Books, offers workshops and a variety of other programs for both adults and youth. Its summary of the new series is “A bold call to amplify LGBTQ+ youth voices and stories that challenge, shift, and expand cultural narratives.” The multi-media workshop series will include mentorship from professional writers, editors, and artists.  

Charlene Choi, director of development, programs, and communications for Dzanc House, says the workshop series was driven by youth who “got serious” during high school writing workshops.

“They had the students reading the poems aloud into a microphone and then talking about their work, and it led to a greater dialogue about really personal things,” Choi says.  

A student in that workshop series suggested that Dzanc House apply for a grant to fund LGBTQ+ programming. When staff did so, they included youth voices there, too. “Students’ work was featured in our grant application, which pretty much is what won us the grant,” Choi says.

Additionally, several of the former workshop participants who helped drive the creation of the new programming are coming back to serve as poet mentors to youth throughout the series.

Beyond the Binary participants will have opportunities to publish their work through Dzanc Books. Their work could be featured on a Dzanc online gallery, a podcast, or even WCBN 88.3 FM, which has aired recorded readings by Dzanc authors in the past. Dzanc will be collaborating with WCBN, offering broadcast segment production workshops to Dzanc students for Dzanc’s in-house micro podcast productions. 

Beyond the Binary workshops will consist of a series of “Sunday Salons at Dzanc House” from 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. on the second Sunday of the month starting Nov. 9, with flexible registration. Students can attend one or all of the workshops. Registration at this link is not required, but recommended.