This timeline was created as the digital companion to one of the chapters of the book that C. Rivera Velázquez is writing under the same title, Brevísima revisión del quehacer mediático y cultural LGBTQIA+ y cuir en Santo Domingo y San Juan for their book, “De un Pájaro, las Dos Patas: Queer Media and Performance in the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico”. One of the objectives of the book is to guide the reader through a chronological parallel overview of the growth of human rights, feminism, body and sex positivity manifestations (and key detractors) over the first quarter of this century in the city of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic and in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Why have these two timelines side-by-side? One of the goals behind creating these timelines is to aid comparative research around intermingled Dominican and Puertorrican pasts, presents and futures by tracing momentums in queer media and performance as well as LGBTQIA+ activism in both Caribbean contexts. While the emphasis is to observe the abundance of cultural events, discussions and media after the year 2000, the timelines also include sparse information of key news clippings and historical findings from events from the 17th and 20th century that gives us hints about how queer sexuality was shaped and experienced given the sociopolitical and cultural landscape before the turn of the 21st century.
The review of these key epiphanic moments can lead us to identify key generational shifts in the growing expression of irreverence and detachment from cisheteropatriarchal norms or those norms that center and benefit male-, heterosexual- and cisgender-centered systems of power. This timeline compiles, engages and contributes an easily updatable historical – always in construction platform — to help us understand what makes up the landscape feminist and cuir interventions in the region.