A visual history of Concordia’s 2SLGBTQIA+ community
Since Concordia’s founding in 1974, the university’s 2SLGBTQIA+ community has made its presence felt on campus walls, hallways and common spaces — transforming them into vibrant canvases for self-expression, celebration and solidarity.
From striking posters to evocative public art, these visual pieces capture moments of identity, resilience and pride.
Poster for the screening of the 1978 French comedy La Cage aux Folles which was screened by the Lesbian and Gay Friends of Concordia, the student group founded in 1978.
Poster for the 1989 “Stonewall Danse” organized by the Lesbian and Gay Friends of Concordia. Founded in 1978, the LGFC changed its name to the gender-neutral Concordia Queer Collective in 1992.
“Lesbians of Color Group” poster, estimated date 1991, from the archives of the Lesbian Studies Coalition.
Lesbian Studies Coalition poster for the “Madonna, Dildoes and Dykes!!!” event held at the Simone de Beauvoir Institute in February 1991.
Brochure for the landmark “La Ville en Rose” international conference on Lesbian and Gay Studies held at Concordia and Université du Québec à Montréal in 1992.
Poster for “Anti. Bodies,” an exhibition of student works on HIV/AIDS held at Concordia on April 10, 2003.
Concordia’s HIV/AIDS Advisory Committee created this 1993 poster for a series of six monthly lectures on the culture and politics of the AIDS pandemic.
The student newspaper The Link was established in 1980 and has regularly published queer-centric editions. Its annual Gay Issue, now known as the Gender and Sexuality Issue, “sparked backlash and threats, with thousands of copies ripped from stands by those who opposed it” when it was first published in 1982.
1982
1989
2021
In January 2021, Concordia's student-funded Centre for Gender Advocacy, as a co-plaintiff, won a landmark constitutional challenge in Quebec Superior Court. The case asserted the civil rights of trans, non-binary and intersex individuals.
Justice Gregory Moore ruled that certain provisions of the Quebec Civil Code were unconstitutional, specifically those that prevented non-binary people from updating their sex on their Act of Birth records to reflect their gender identity.
