The Human Rights Directorate together with the Ministry for Justice, Equality and Governance, the MGRM, the University of Malta’s Department of Gender & Sexualities and Europe Direct, have launched a publication called ‘Mapping the Rainbow – Researching the diverse colours of the LGBTIQ community’, edited by Dr Claire Azzopardi Lane and Dr Marceline Naudi.
The publication is the result of a symposium that took place in May of 2019, hosted by the Department of Gender and Sexualities, where the collaborative research of a number of students and academics across different faculties within the university and at different levels (undergraduate, Masters and PhD) was presented to the public for the first time.
The publication sheds light on various aspects relating to the equality of rights experienced by the Maltese LGBTIQ community, including non-conformity and institutions, social issues and education.
It was published just days after ILGA’s European Rainbow Map Index confirmed that Malta retained first place for LGBTIQ+ rights for the fifth year running.
Mapping the Rainbow is a good example of the University’s community engagement, collaboration between the University and outside entities, where all stand to gain. In fact, the Department of Gender & Sexualities, the Europe Direct Contact Centre, through UM academics Dr Marceline Naudi, Dr Mark Harwood and Dr Claire Azzopardi Lane, as well as the Malta LGBTIQ Rights Movement (NGO), and the Human Rights Directorate (state) all collaborated in this study.
Both present at the launch of the publication, the Minister for Justice, Equality and Governance, Dr Edward Zammit Lewis, and Parliamentary Secretary for Equality and Reforms, Dr Rosianne Cutajar, had words of praise for the book, and reiterated the government’s commitment towards pushing forward the equality of the LGBTIQ community.
“We hope this is but one of the first of many opportunities we get to work together to make progress on this front”, said co-editor Dr Azzopardi Lane.
Soft copies of the publication may be obtained online.