Fordham University has hosted events to celebrate LGBTQ+ History Month this October. The events have been mainly organized by the Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA), with collaboration from other groups, such as the Pride Alliance and Counseling and Psychological Services (CPS). OMA also sponsors an LGBTQ+ committee made up of students who work with the OMA staff to organize events, such as this month’s celebrations.
Events have been held at both Rose Hill and Lincoln Center campuses, starting with each campus hosting a “Flags on the Lawn” event at the start of the month. The events allowed students to create their own pride flags and display them, celebrating their identity. Fordham also acknowledged important recognition days, National Coming Out Day and International Lesbian Day, which occur as part of LGBTQ+ History Month.
One of the larger events for the month was the second annual Pride parade hosted by OMA. The parade took place on Wednesday, Oct. 16, from 6 to 8 p.m. The event consisted of the parade, food, socialization and a drag show. The drag show featured three drag queens: Chola Spears, Lanye Armon and Harriet Tugsman.
“It was so fun, very exciting. [I feel] all the joyful energy when we’re able to do an event like this,” stated Marie Castro, assistant director of OMA at Lincoln Center, after the parade. She said that she was very proud to see how, with their second annual parade, they were able to grow the event. Students at the parade expressed that they felt the atmosphere was very welcoming and felt accepted by Fordham’s queer community. “I love the queer community at Fordham,” said Lily Genovese, FCRH ’26. “I would say this is the most accepting group of people.”
The parade consisted of golf carts driven by Ram Van drivers, which were decorated to be floats in the parade. Presley Kmeta-Suarez, FCRH ’26, is a Ram Van driver who learned of the pride parade because of the need for golf cart drivers. “It was so much fun, we got to decorate the golf carts before we started the parade,” Kmeta-Suarez said.
Kiet Vo, GSB ’27, learned of the parade through his orientation group chat. “I wanted to see what was going on and support the cause,” he said. Multiple of the students expressed that they were particularly looking forward to watching the drag show.
Engagement with the programs put on for LGBTQ+ History Month has been high according to Fordham’s LGBTQ+ committee. Samirali Masoud, FCLC ’27 and the cultural programming coordinator of the LGBTQ+ committee, said she has found it gratifying to see how many people the events have reached.
“My highlight of the past month of programming was when a man approached our flags on the lawn tabling at Lincoln Center,” said Masoud. “He was presumably a graduate student or faculty member who referred to himself as ‘just an old gay guy.’ He was shocked that we were allowed to have this openly queer programming that celebrated being LGBTQ+ on campus and even told us that he was kicked out of his Catholic high school for being gay. It was such an eye-opening conversation that made me realize the impact of the work we were doing.”
Masoud said that she hopes the programming normalizes queerness in all spaces and reminds students that identifying as LGBTQ+ at Fordham is not isolating, as there are many other peers who identify as such as well. “I hope students feel celebrated, I hope to curate an environment at Fordham that is so disconnected from the hatred of the outside world,” she said.
The events are not over yet. On Wednesday, Oct. 23, OMA, the Pride Alliance, CPS and the Fordham University Visual Arts Club are collaborating to host a Queer Art Night in the Rose Hill OMA office. On Thursday, Oct. 24, there will be a Rainbow Social at Lincoln Center and an open mic night at Rose Hill, both of which locations are still to be determined. The last event for LGBTQ+ History Month will be a Halloween movie night on Oct. 29 at 7 p.m.
Students who are interested in any of the events still to come can refer to the OMA or Fordham LGBTQ+ committee Instagram pages, @fordhamoma and @fordhamlgbtq, for more information.
Additional reporting was done by Adithi Vimalanathan.
