Alexia Arani

ALEXIA ARANI, then a graduate student at University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California, was awarded funding in April 2019 to aid research on ‘Queering Care: The Politics of Care in U.S. Queer and Trans Communities of Color,’ supervised by Dr. Saiba Varma. Funding allowed the researcher to conduct twelve months of ethnographic field research on how queer and trans people of color (QTPoC) in San Diego, California, navigate, create, and challenge care systems through everyday survival practices and sociopolitical activism. The researcher conducted participant-observation with eleven QTPoC, accompanying research participants to medical appointments, social services offices, and organizing meetings, and participated in collective care practices, such as crowdfunding and other forms of mutual aid. The researcher also volunteered with a local LGBT community center, and interviewed eight professional care workers employed in nonprofit agencies and biomedical institutions. These forms of research were supplemented with digital ethnography through the archiving and analysis of social media posts, memes, and articles that explored topics of self and collective care. The fieldwork enabled the researcher to collect ample data on the care networks the research participants utilized, and the challenges, limitations, and tensions of these networks in the face of overwhelming need and limited resources.