Dyked new york: The space between geographical imagination and materialization of lesbian-queer bars and neighbourhoods

This chapter focuses on the spaces created and constructed by the activities, activism and politics of Trans in the Centre as a radical queer/feminist/transgender group who worked within the mainstream institutional space of the Gay Centre. Queer geography has devoted very limited attention to autonomous spaces and the activism that creates them, and has almost completely ignored the possibility of creating autonomous activism within the centres run by non-profit organizations (NGOs) or municipalities. Autonomous centres are based on a principle of unity in diversity: they are places where anarchist, anti-racist, feminist and queer politics can come together. Tel Aviv became the gay capital of Israel and, unlike the formal capital, Jerusalem, its municipality began to support the LGBT community by producing the biggest gay pride parade and financing the Gay Centre, among other things. Some studies on LGBTQ activism in organizations have focused on the way in which LGBT centres produce queer space and herald themselves as sites of counter-publicity.