Lake Erie Ink, Summer Zine Making

I recently had the pleasure of speaking to a group of young people at an ongoing zine making workshop at Lake Erie Ink.

These preteens were well into zine making before I was invited. Over the last several weeks they had made individual zines, and collaborative zines. I talked mostly about zine history, zine culture, and what's happening today, including how the internet has effected zine making and distribution. They were a great audience and asked really smart questions.

I was allowed to take some zines home, and I took four of the collaborative ones: Animals Summer Days, Highway to Learning and New Beginnings. Summer days was my favorite, because of the wonderful art, and there was a funny story about frozen yogurt.

I'll be donating these to the Cleveland Zine Library, so if you want to look at them that's where they'll be. Also, Mac's Backs on Coventry will have some of their other zines available.

It was really wonderful to see the next generation of zinesters in action.



Jack Cheiky

Out of Order, Queer and Trans Youth Resistance

Out of Order, Queer and Trans Youth Resistance

36 pages, digest, photocopied black and white

$2.50 (?)

This appears to be the first issue, written primarily by LGBT adults for LGBT youth. It has great potential.

In addition to personal experiences, there's a list of terminology, and also a list of resources, (mainly around Montreal, where this zine comes from.)

Except for the front and back covers it is all text, so there's a lot to read. The content is not great. There's not a lot of super interesting stuff considering the broad, rich topic.

However, it hits the mark in sending up a signal flare and reaching out to LGBT youth. If I were a queer or trans young person I'd be excited and grateful to find kindred voices, especially if I wasn't lucky enough to come from a particularly hip or progressive school system.

[I have a young trans second cousin who's high school refused to let him graduate with his trans name on his diploma. The students rallied around him and eventually the principal was compelled to back down. While this is a great example of how the up and coming generation is way less prejudice than previous generations, this type of support is still not the norm. there's still a long way to go and LGBT youth need these kinds of resources.]

What I would like to see, in addition to some better edited content, is contributions from the youth themselves. Offering them wisdom and support from experience is great, but giving them a voice is important too.

I picked this up at the Fluxxii distro table at the Scranton zine fest, but the site is down. You can also get it from Quimbys or contact the maker directly...

Quimby's

http://www.quimbys.com/store/5146

Fluxxii

http://www.fluxxiidistro.com/

queertransyouthzine at gmail

(spelling corrected)

Power of the pen tackles bullying

Power of the pen tackles bullying

By Duncan Bick

Published: 01 December, 2010

YOUNG members of a Findhorn Foundation-based club have come up with a new weapon in the fight against bullying.

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Moray Art Centre's Manga Club has created the 'Manga-zine' a new publication, which they hope will inform and assist against the unwelcome practice.