‘We still face serious challenges’ – LGBT+ lecture preview

Society needs to talk more about minority identities if we are to achieve equality on LGBT+ rights, the University’s Diversity & Inclusion Dean has warned ahead of our flagship LGBT+ lecture.

This week’s Wolfenden Lecture will be presented by award-winning journalist, author and lecturer Tufayel Ahmed. He will discuss his debut novel The Way Out, which features a gay man coming out to his strict Muslim Bangladeshi family.

The free event on Thursday 22 September runs from 6pm – 8pm in Henley Business School on Whiteknights Campus. Register to attend.

The lecture will be hosted by Dr Ruvi Ziegler, Chair of the University’s LGBT+ Staff Network, and Dr Allán Laville, Dean for Diversity and Inclusion, with support from Nozomi Tolworthy, Diversity and Inclusion Advisor.

Dr Laville said: “I am really looking forward to this year’s Wolfenden Lecture focusing on This Way Out by Tufayel Ahmed. I found the book resonated with me in various ways including sexuality, mental health and classism, and it is an excellent example of the importance of raising the profile of intersectional minority identities.

“The book is also a very good reminder of why we need to be talking about the marginalisation of LGBT+ individuals in the UK in 2022. We are a nation that has seen some progress in LGBT+ equality, but we are not there yet.”

Historic report

The annual Wolfenden Lecture – back in-person for 2022 – is named in honour of the 1957 Wolfenden Committee report, chaired by the University’s then-Vice-Chancellor Lord Wolfenden.

The report became a key milestone in LGBT+ history in the UK when it recommended that ‘homosexual behaviour between consenting adults in private should no longer be a criminal offence’.

Tufayel has written for CNN, Newsweek, The Independent, The Big Issue and more. He is currently Entertainment Editor at Insider. His debut novel The Way Out was released July this year.

Find out more about the speaker and purchase the This Way Out at tufayel.co.

>>> Read more about Lord Wolfenden on the Special Collections website.

The Wolfenden Lecture is organised in collaboration with the LGBT+ Staff Network and Diversity and Inclusion Team. The inaugural lecture took place in 2017.

‘Oppression, social barriers, intolerance’

Dr Ziegler said: “While we have witnessed significant legal advances in LGBT+ equality in parts of the world, in 2022, there remain many places where LGBT+ persons are not free to live, thrive, and be partnered to whomever they wish.

“LGBT+ persons' experiences are shaped globally by criminal sanctions and oppression, social barriers, intolerance, and unwillingness to accept and recognise them for they are. Yet, even in political spaces where LGBT+ people generally enjoy legal protections, we still face serious challenges.

“Alarmingly, according to a YouGov survey, 26% of UK adults would be ashamed to have an LGBT+ child. The lived realities that Tufayel Ahmed’s book magisterially presents in This Way Out offer us important insights into some of the challenges facing LGBT+ persons in the UK and beyond.”