Queering Chaos Conversations: Queering Family and Community

In the 2nd of five QUEERING CHAOS CONVERSATIONS by Dr. Nicole Rawls, we welcome in Roy Kinsey, Kristen Kaza & Dr. Moya Bailey. Facilitated also by Forest Brooks, enjoy an intimate night of conversation.

Many times, when we talk about family, the focus on its nuclear form - wife/husband/2 kids and a pet. This narrow construct of family then influences how we understand and create community. As Queer folks, we often need to (re)make families when we “come out” because this narrowed definition doesn’t account for our existence.

So what does it mean to redefine our understanding of family as a way to reconstitute community? Let’s explore these questions as we bring together to the table three Queer folks whose work revolves around queering family and community as a way to worldbuild liberatory futures in the present. We will gather round a table to talk to one another and the audience - join us and be part of the project!

Doors at 6pm with a one hour happy hour before our panel starts at 7pm. Dorothy remains open until 11pm.

Tickets are a sliding scale of $10-20 before doors and $20 at the door.

Dorothy is 21+ and requires physical ID for all to enter. Dorothy is also ADA accessible with elevator access on Campbell Ave. If you are a guest who requires elevator access, please wait by the black door with our logo in the window and call our staff to assist: 773-770-3799

Please note: refund requests are only available up to 24h before the show (11/17, 7pm). No other refund requests will be honored.

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ABOUT THE HOSTS & PANELISTS

Roy Kinsey is a distinguished Chicago-born rapper, librarian, and cultural curator, often referred to as "The Rapbrarian." His powerful music, including acclaimed albums like Blackie: A Story by Roy Kinsey and KINSEY: A Memoir, showcases a deft skill for storytelling as he chronicles his life as a Black queer artist and a child of the Great Migration. As a librarian with the Chicago Public Library, Kinsey has leveraged his passion for knowledge to create Rapbrary, a philosophy and platform dedicated to preserving rap and hip-hop as culturally significant literary art forms. Kinsey's work has been recognized by national outlets like NPR, Billboard, and the Chicago Tribune for his unflinching commitment to truth, legacy, and community healing.

Kristen Kaza, known affectionately to many as Chicago’s Party Mom, is a cultural producer on a mission to foster community connection and activate joy. For over two decades, she has dedicated herself to bridging the worlds of creative laborers and brands & institutions in pursuit of building a more equitable entertainment industry. As Creative Director of No Small Plans Productions, Kristen has been the architect of hundreds of “parties with a purpose,” most notably the legendary Chicago LGBTQ+ dance party Slo ‘Mo, which she founded in 2011. She is also the Co-Founder of Reunion Chicago, a sliding scale event space and project incubator for LGBTQ+ and BIPOC creatives that supported hundreds of artists and organizations from 2016-2021.
In 2024, Kristen was named one of the 30 Most Fascinating Chicagoans by CS Magazine and in 2025 the Equality Illinois Community Pride Honoree and Gaggy’s nightlife awards Life of the Party (lifetime achievement). Kristen is an educator, having taught communications at her alma mater Columbia College for a decade, as well as a public speaker and workshop facilitator. She serves on the LGBTQ+ Advisory Board to Mayor Brandon Johnson’s administration and on the board of the historic Ramova Theatre music venue. Kristen lives in Chicago where she is raising twins with her wife and a village of loved ones.

Dr. Moya Bailey is a kitchen witch descended from Rebecca, Mamie the Midwife, Flossie, and Alberta, all from scratch cooks who use food as art, medicine, and magic. Moya Bailey is a Professor at Northwestern University and is the founder of the Digital Apothecary and co-founder of the Black Feminist Health Science Studies Collective. She is the digital alchemist for the Octavia E. Butler Legacy Network and the Board President of Allied Media Projects, a Detroit-based movement media organization that supports an ever-growing network of activists and organizers. She is a co-author of #HashtagActivism: Networks of Race and Gender Justice (MIT Press, 2020) and is the author of Misogynoir Transformed: Black Women’s Digital Resistance (New York University Press, 2021). She is an award winning documentarian after completing the short documentary You Just Watch & See(2025) featuring her late Cousin Dollie, and is completing a docuseries Misogynoir in Medicine.

Dr. Nicole Rawls is a Black Queer cultural strategist, anthropologist, and spiritual practitioner who guides individuals and organizations toward liberated futures by reconnecting them to the wisdom of their bodies, stories, and ancestral knowledge. With a PhD in Anthropology from Michigan State University, Dr. Rawls spent over 15 years in higher education as a professor and senior administrator, leading human-centered initiatives, founding institutes, securing over $7 million in grants, and designing nationally recognized programs. She has held roles at institutions including Michigan State University, the University of Bristol (UK), Beloit College, and Brown University before leaving academia in 2021 to fully step into her own creative and strategic vision.Now the founder of two entities—Embodied Futures Lab, her consulting and learning studio, and Dream Praxis Studio, her creative and storytelling space—Dr. Rawls has developed a signature methodology called Embodied Strategic Dreaming. This praxis-based framework blends critical analysis, somatic inquiry, spiritual insight, and liberatory strategy to help people and institutions reclaim their agency and craft bold, human-centered futures. Her current project is examining the ways Queer communities are navigating the current socio-political and economic moment, and what it means to lead with ones queerness in a time of chaos.

Forest Brooks is an artist, songwriter, producer, sound architect, instructional designer, and cultural preservationist. He is the co-founder of ChiMarronage, a local arts collective, with Dr Nicole Rawls. He uses his knowledge and experience to work with artists to connect with and concentrate their human experience into culturally grounded works of art. He obtained a B.A. in English from Southern Methodist University in 2007.

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