Queer Age / Queer Youth
In 2023, HISS launched with a provocation around age, youth, and queer temporality
The program unfolded through workshops, field trips, and public exhibitions that challenged normative timelines and reimagined how queerness is shaped, studied, and lived.
These three moments—Queer Design, CLOAK, and Pride at Play—captured the interdisciplinary spirit of the inaugural cohort and offered bold new ways of teaching, making, and being.
Three moments that defined this year
PE Class offered a re-do of one of school’s most dreaded environments. Coach Rawlings led the group through queer warm-ups, cooperative movement drills, and games that rewired shame into laughter and connection.
P.E. Class
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“P.E. was never safe for me, but at HISS it became theatre — a space to move freely, be seen, and express strengths usually hidden in school settings.”
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From exaggerated laps around the RD Watt corridor to partner stretches that leaned more into laughter than form, the class allowed for experimentation with bodies, boundaries, and belonging.
There was no yelling from the sidelines, no one picked last, and no pressure to perform strength. Instead, the room pulsed with sneakers squeaking, wheezy giggles, and a strong sense of camaraderie. It was a gym class for the queer classroom, designed with softness, humor, and reparative intent.
CLOAK
Though not part of the HISS program, CLOAK took shape within the wider SSSHARC community through the work of several HISS-affiliated faculty. The project reimagined the lab coat as more than professional uniform. It became a canvas for queerness, identity, and resistance.
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“CLOAK emerged from a desire to challenge this reality and to bring social visibility to a community that often remains hidden within the broader diversity discussions”
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Through stitching, printing, and modification, artists and researchers transformed these garments into wearable archives. While HISS participants did not directly take part, CLOAK echoed many of the themes explored during the institute.
It offered a parallel inquiry into how queer presence is expressed, muted, or rewritten in institutional spaces. The project expanded the possibilities for what queer scholarship and visibility can look like—beyond the classroom, and into public space.
Pride at play
Curated by Xavier Ho and hosted in conjunction with WorldPride, Pride at Play was more than a game exhibition.
It was a live archive of queer interaction showcasing indie games from across the Asia-Pacific that celebrated intimacy, softness, confusion, and play
Visitors moved between screens, joypads, and handmade interfaces in a space where touch and feeling guided the experience more than rules or objectives.
For many HISS participants, the exhibition offered a different kind of scholarship. Games became speculative essays. Mechanics became arguments.
“HISS had brought me community, reignited love for playing, learning and a feeling of belonging that can only be described as coming home and coming in”
Reflections from HISS faculty members
HISS allowed me to heal the aloneness I felt as a child in school. I have somehow been able to reimagine those school years through the new prism that HISS has offered me. With this new interpretive framework, I now see those memories in technicolour. But it wasn’t just the content of HISS that unlocked this new potential. It was the people. It is such a rare and beautiful experience to share spaces with such an incredible group of people for two weeks. A truly once-in-a-lifetime experience for which I am grateful to my core. The conversations, the laughter, and the hugs. The support. It has been humbling and inspiring.
Anonymous
Dear HISS, The hands you’ve offered me have provided more than I could have ever imagined. You offered me a hand that l waved me in. A hand that patted me on the back. A hand that opened doors on my behalf. A hand that pointed me in the direction of new friends. A hand that provided nourishment in times of need. A hand that applauded my accomplishments. A hand that prodded me back onto the path when I lost my way. A hand that lifted me up. I have to hand it to you, HISS. You’ve changed my life. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Xx
Anonymous
See the happy faces of this year's cohort
Allison Xinyi Guo
Ash Catonio
Bailey Flynn
Bishop Owis
Florence Smith Nicholls
Florin Douglas
Hannah Maitland
Hao Zheng
James Gardiner
Jason Goopy
Joe Jukes
Jonno Graffam
Lee Iskander
Sasha Bailey
Madelaine Coelho
Mathew Tyne
Niamh White
Sarah Demekech Graham
Sarah Hoffert
Sophia Garlick Bock
Tate McAllister
Victoria Serafini
Clara Bradbury-Rance
Sam Stiegler
Adam Greteman
Xavier Ho
Kelly Panchyshyn
Jen Gilbert
(Digital archive)
Each year of HISS has been carefully documented and curated into our digital archive. It is a living record of the creative, intellectual and collaborative work produced by our cohorts.
More than a collection of research papers and classroom materials, these archives capture the spirit of HISS as a queer-led classroom where learning is embodied, experimental and collective.
Inside, you will find academic reflections, workshop outcomes, creative projects and glimpses of the conversations and relationships that shaped each year.
By making this archive accessible, we invite future researchers, educators and community members to engage with the ideas, practices and pedagogies fostered at HISS. It is a space where queer knowledge is celebrated, shared and continuously reimagined.