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Commemorating LGBTQ Culture on Campus

“Coming Out Day” celebration is Oct. 9 on Bryan Center Plaza

Volunteers and Duke Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity staff hand out
Volunteers and Duke Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity staff hand out "Love=Love" T-shirts during Coming Out Day in the Bryan Center Plaza each year. Photo by Duke Photography

Damon Seils is an openly gay man, a health services researcher at the Duke Clinical Research Institute and co-chair of the Duke University LGBT Task Force, which has tackled issues such as adding gender identity to the university’s nondiscrimination policy.

In his 15 years at Duke, he says the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community on campus has become more visible, and more employees are out in the workplace.

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“I certainly make a point of being out in my workplace and hope that’s something that makes it possible for other people to do the same,” Seils said. “It’s been an important part of my experience at Duke, being in a place where I feel comfortable being out.”

On Oct. 9, in recognition of National Coming Out Day, which always falls on Oct. 11, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender employees and students and allies will gather on the Bryan Center Plaza to dance, sing and distribute “Love=Love” shirts as a symbol of support. The event will start at 11 a.m. and go until 2 p.m.

“I can’t even tell you how many people I have had say that it was coming to and witnessing that event that really helped them to feel more comfortable with themselves,” said Janie Long, associate vice provost for undergraduate education and former director of Duke’s Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity. “It’s a big public celebration of a part of people’s identities, and so seeing that other people are able to embrace and affirm is also, I think, for many people a very public signal.”

In addition to the “Coming Out Day” celebration on Oct. 9, Duke is dedicating the semester to commemorating LGBTQ history at the university. The schedule of events, “Queering Duke History,” will involve panel discussions, a film screening of The New Black, an exhibit of LGBTQ historical pieces uncovered in the Duke University Archives and more.

Justin Clapp, director of access and outreach at Duke, attends Coming Out Day as a proud staff member.

He and his husband, Joseph, were legally married in a courthouse park in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in May.

“I think about living authentically so often,” said Clapp, who regularly works with low-income students. “I know that being proud and being bold and being vibrant is providing some form of modeling and especially with first-generation college students who essentially have to come out of their own closet and identify as poor or identify as first generation. I’m showing them that it’s OK to be all of who you are, all the time.”