BiReCon: An International Academic Conference on Bisexuality Including the Program for BiReCon

Abstract

This article charts the past, present and future of the BiReCon event, which was the inspiration for this special issue of the Journal of Bisexuality. We provide the historical context for such an academic conference on bisexuality, and the key research which had been conducted on bisexuality in the UK prior to this. The aims of the 2010 BiReCon event are summarized, and a brief overview of the event is presented. Finally, we chart some potential future directions for BiReCon and other similar conferences. The full program for BiReCon can be found at the end of the article, along with links to YouTube clips from the event and other related Websites.

KEYWORDS:

• BiReCon
• conference
• community
• activism
• academia
• BiCon
• ICB

Acknowledgments

All authors are from the BiUK group.

Thanks again to all of the people who helped with BiReCon 2010, particularly to the marvelous BiCon 2010 team, the University of East London staff, Erich Schultz, Sarah Wilmott, Helen Bowes-Catton, Esther Saxey, Tracey Plowman and Caroline Walters. Also many thanks to the American Institute of Bisexuality and the Open University for sponsoring the event.

Meg Barker is a psychology lecturer at the Open University specializing in counseling and psychotherapy. She co-edits the journal Psychology & Sexuality, and has produced two edited collections with her co-editor Darren Langdridge on sadomasochism and non-monogamous relationships. She is also a practicing therapist and co-organizes Critical Sexology, the College of Sexual and Relationship Therapists conferences, and BiReCon. She is currently co-authoring a book on sexuality and gender for therapists, psychologists and health professionals, and has recently finished a popular psychology book about relationships.

Address: Psychology in Social Sciences, The Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes, MK76AA, UK. Email: [email protected].

Christina Richards is the Senior Specialist Psychology Associate at the West London Mental Health NHS Trust (Charing Cross) National Gender Identity Clinic and is a member of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health. She also works broadly in critical mental health and is currently undertaking her doctorate in Counselling Psychology specializing in gender and sexualities. She publishes and lectures on critical mental health, gender and sexualities, is the first author of an upcoming book on gender and sexuality for psychologists and therapists and is co-organizer of BiReCon.

Address: Charing Cross Gender Identity Clinic, West London Mental Health NHS Trust, 179–183 Fulham Palace Road, Hammersmith, London, SW165PQ. E-mail: [email protected].

Rebecca L. Jones is a Lecturer in Health and Social Care in the Faculty of Health and Social Care at The Open University, UK. Her research interests are chiefly in the social, narrative and discursive construction of ageing, sexuality and sexuality in later life. Her latest book, co-edited with Richard Ward, LGBT issues: Looking beyond categories (Edinburgh, Dunedin Academic Press, 2010), applies theoretical concepts about the complexity and variability of sexual and gender identities to the specificities of health and social care practices.

Address: Dr. Rebecca L. Jones, Faculty of Health and Social Care, The Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes, MK17 8QQ, UK. E-mail: [email protected].

Surya Monro has published extensively in the fields of gender and sexuality, notably on the topics of transgender, lesbian, gay and bisexual equality, and sexual/gender citizenship. She is the author of Gender Politics: Citizenship, Activism, and Sexual Diversity (Pluto Press, 2005) and is currently writing, together with Professor Diane Richardson, a book on sexuality and equality for Palgrave MacMillan. Surya has been involved in a wide range of research projects, including research in India and South Africa. Her most recent projects are about LGBT equalities in local government (co-applicant, with Diane Richardson as PI, http://research.ncl.ac.uk/selg/), and social cohesion in the UK (with colleagues at the University of Huddersfield).

Address: The Centre for Research in the Social Sciences, University of Huddersfield, Huddersfield, HD1 3DH, UK. E-mail [email protected].

Notes

1. See www.biuk.org for a complete list of the founder members of this group which includes Helen Bowes-Catton, Caroline Walters, and Tracey Plowman, in addition to the authors of the current article. It should be noted that several other people have been involved in the broader group of U.K. bisexuality researchers over the years, notably the authors of Barker, Bowes-Catton, Iantaffi, Cassidy, and Brewer (2008) and Barker, Richards, and Bowes-Catton (2009).

2. See www.stonewall.org.uk, www.pfc.org.uk, for details.