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Night Is Not a Luxury: Queer Survival, Music, and Urban Struggle

On October 11, 2025, from 12:00 to 13:00, the Beato Innovation District in Lisbon will host a panel conversation that places nightlife at the very center of urban life, belonging, and resistance: “Night Is Not a Luxury: Queer Survival, Music, and Urban Struggle.”

Curated by Manuel García-Ruiz (International Night Studies Network / ISCTE-IUL) and Jordi Nofre (LXNights Research Group, NOVA University Lisbon), this session invites us to rethink nightlife as more than entertainment. Nightlife sustains the social, cultural, and emotional practices of diverse communities. It builds cohesion, care, and shared memory.

For queer, trans, and nonbinary communities, live music venues have long offered safe havens to explore gender, desire, and identity beyond dominant norms. These spaces are affective archives—repositories of intimacy, collective memory, and political struggle. Yet, speculative urban policies and exclusionary practices increasingly threaten their survival, eroding the fragile ecosystems of solidarity and visibility they sustain.

The conversation will bring together:

  • Maria Teresa Lacerda (INET-md, NOVA FCSH), musician and ethnomusicologist.
  • sér vales, (INET-md, NOVA FCSH), Galician ethnomusicologist.
  • Adam Eldridge (University of Westminster), urban sociologist specializing in nightlife and the politics of space.
  • Jordi Nofre (NOVA University Lisbon), researcher on nightlife economies and youth cultures.

Moderation: Manuel García-Ruiz.

This 60-minute discussion (50 minutes of dialogue, followed by 10 minutes of Q&A) will explore how to preserve nightlife as a collective space of care, visibility, and everyday political action.

📍 Location: Sala dos Fornos, Beato Innovation District, Lisbon
🗓 Date: October 11, 2025
🌐 Language: English, with simultaneous subtitling into Portuguese

👉 More info: millisboa.com


OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
Manuel Garcia-Ruiz (September 30, 2025). Night Is Not a Luxury: Queer Survival, Music, and Urban Struggle. International Night Studies Network. Retrieved March 13, 2026 from https://doi.org/10.58079/14tmj