Another Newspaper Editorial Board Endorses The Equality Act
The Minneapolis Star Tribune has become the latest major organization to endorse The Equality Act.
HRC.org
All posts by GayFriendschat.com
Gay Marriage Proposal of the Day: Mister Chase and Brian
Gay Marriage Proposal of the Day: Mister Chase and Brian
Michael Chase DiMartino (aka Mister Chase) has been dating his boyfriend Brian for 6 years and decided this year in Provincetown that it was time to pop the question.
Being a pop singer-songwriter, Mister Chase decided to let the creative juices flow and wrote a song for the occasion, intending to craft a music video of their days together (“The Best Days”) as a gift to celebrate their engagement.
Would you like to see how it turned out?
Of course you would:
If you’d like to check out some of Mister Chase’s other songs, here’s his cover of “Take Me To Church” and another cover, Bonnie McKee’s “American Girl”, in which he takes the track in a male direction.
Check out these other beautiful gay marriage proposals of Justin and Wade, Braeden and Ryan, the Italian acrobat couple, and Patrick and Gavin at Disney World’s Boardwalk resort.
Or browse a lot more of them on our Gay Marriage Proposal channel.
The post Gay Marriage Proposal of the Day: Mister Chase and Brian appeared first on Towleroad.
Andy Towle
Teen jailed after threatening gay man that he would ‘cut his dick off’
Teen jailed after threatening gay man that he would ‘cut his dick off’
A man was kidnapped by a 19-year-old who threatened to ‘cut his dick off’ if he didn’t give him money, a court has heard.
In what may rank as one of the worst Craigslist meet-ups ever, a 51-year-old had posted an ad on the website looking for a sexual encounter in Darwin, Australia.
Mitchell Hall, the 19-year-old, responded and asked him to pick him from Winnellie after midnight on 25 January. He was waiting for him with a beer and they drove to nearby Fisherman’s Wharf.
When the victim was parking the car, Hall pulled out a knife, the NT Supreme Court was told.
The court then heard Hall pushed the knife into the man’s groin, threatening to ‘cut his dick off’. When they finally reached an ATM, the victim logged into his bank account.
Hall then shouted in rage when he realised his target was $7,000 in debt, screaming and calling him a ‘faggot’.
The victim managed to escape when Hall stabbed the knife into the roof of the car, punching his kidnapper in the face. When he ran, he tripped and fractured two toes, his wrist and tore a knee ligament.
When he realised he had lost his victim, Hall then drove to Palmerston where he set the car alight.
Hall’s defense said the teen has a ‘conduct disorder’, considering he was expelled from several schools for violence and started using the drug ice when he was 16.
The robbery and attack was not drug or alcohol-fueled, the authorities decided.
Hall had faced life in prison when he admitted aggravated robbery, unlawfully cause serious harm, deprivation of liberty, demand with menaces, car theft and arson.
‘Your conduct was quite bizarre,’ Chief Justice Trevor Riley told Hall in court.
‘The victim described the ordeal as “sheer terror”… [and you have] shown no remorse or insight.’
Hall was sentenced to five years and eight months in prison.
The post Teen jailed after threatening gay man that he would ‘cut his dick off’ appeared first on Gay Star News.
Joe Morgan
www.gaystarnews.com/article/teen-jailed-after-threatening-gay-man-that-he-would-cut-his-dick-off/
DVD: “Spy,” “Fulboy,” “Lyle,” “Dishonored Bodies,” & More!
DVD: “Spy,” “Fulboy,” “Lyle,” “Dishonored Bodies,” & More!
Kick back with a whole mash-up of genres and queer twists on genres this week in home entertainment.
We have Argentinean football drama Fulboy (above), Melissa McCarthy comedy Spy, slow burn horror indie Lyle and Spanish gay short compilation Dishonored Bodies.
Scroll down for the trailers and details!
($26.99 Blu-ray, $19.99 DVD; Fox)
Melissa McCarthy and her Bridesmaids director Paul Feig re-team for this comedy about a C.I.A. desk jockey thrown into field work when an agent is killed. Funny stuff and of course espionage action, with supporting turns from Allison Janney, Jude Law, Jason Statham, and Rose Byrne as the villain. Extras include featurettes deleted scenes and alternate scenes.
($24.99 DVD; TLA)
Argentinean Martin, who always nursed dreams of being a pro soccer player, is allowed to intrude that world thanks to his brother Tomas. Armed with a camera, Martin truly gets the inside scoop on this homoerotic world — and hot naked bodies.
($24.99 DVD; Breaking Glass Pictures)
A pregnant stay-at-home lesbian mom, Leah (Gaby Hoffman), moves into a new place in Brooklyn with her wife and their toddler daughter. Soon enough Leah feels that something isn’t right in this new place, and things get a bit Rosemary’s Baby…
($24.99 DVD; TLA)
This compilation of nine gay short films by Spanish director Juanmo Carrillo runs the gamut from a romance between neighbors (Scaffolding) to the titular experimental and erotic piece. There’s something for everyone (except perhaps Kim Davis)!
ALSO OUT:
Poltergeist (2015 Remake)
Unexpected
Entourage
Cop Car
Zipper
Aloft
Lawrence Ferber
feedproxy.google.com/~r/queerty2/~3/z7kzkzmaDnY/dvd-spy-fulboy-lyle-dishonored-bodies-more-20150929
Matt Damon Appears on ‘Ellen’ to Correct His Remarks About Gay Actors: WATCH
Matt Damon Appears on ‘Ellen’ to Correct His Remarks About Gay Actors: WATCH
Actor Matt Damon appeared on Ellen and took the time to clarify his comments from a recent interview with The Guardian which angered quite a few people. Damon’s original comments seemed to suggest that gay actors should stay in the closet in order to be more successful:
“I think you’re a better actor the less people know about you period. And sexuality is a huge part of that. Whether you’re straight or gay, people shouldn’t know anything about your sexuality because that’s one of the mysteries that you should be able to play.’”
DeGeneres invited Damon on to clarify his comments. Damon explained that his comments were misconstrued by the media, citing the gay rumors that tabloids circulated in the past regarding Damon’s close working relationship with Ben Affleck as the media taking words, and actions, out of context.
“I was talking about actors are more effective when you know less about their personal lives. And was talking about it in the context of when Ben and I first started and people wrote all these articles, when Good Will Hunting came out, that we were gay because it was two guys who wrote the script. And feeling like oh, well we can’t even like then you have to address it and then it’s like well I’m not gonna throw my friends under the bus, who are gay, and act like it’s some kind of a disease. How do you even address it?”
He added:
“So you’re always in these kind of weird things. But in this day and age I said this thing to The Guardian and it got turned into… and I was just trying to say actors are more effective when they’re a mystery. Right? And somebody picked it up and said I said gay actors should get back in the closet. Which is like I mean it’s stupid, but it is painful when things get said that you don’t believe. And then it gets represented that that’s what you believe. Because in the blogosphere there’s no real penalty for just taking the ball and running with it. Ya know what I mean? You’re just trying to click on your thing.”
DeGeneres also adds some levity to the conversation. Watch:
The post Matt Damon Appears on ‘Ellen’ to Correct His Remarks About Gay Actors: WATCH appeared first on Towleroad.
Anthony Costello
Matt Damon Appears on ‘Ellen’ to Correct His Remarks About Gay Actors: WATCH
After Three Years Jailed With Men, Ashley Diamond Speaks
After Three Years Jailed With Men, Ashley Diamond Speaks
Just two weeks after she was released from Augusta State Medical Prison in Georgia, Ashley Diamond finally heard some good news from a federal judge. She would be allowed to pursue her legal claim that the Department of Corrections in Georgia unlawfully discriminated against her because she is a transgender woman, not only denying her medically necessary transition-related care but allegedly failing to protect her from repeated rapes and assaults while she spent three years incarcerated with men.
“It was torture. I might be free now, but I am still struggling,” Diamond says in a phone interview with The Advocate. “Straight out of solitary confinement, but into another confinement here on parole. Parole stipulates that I must stay here in Rome [Ga.], and this town can be like a prison too. Yes, it’s a town in the Deep South, and down here you feel it even more that the transgender issue is the civil rights issue of our time.”
The latest development in Diamond’s case, which epitomizes the struggles of transgender inmates nationwide, arrived just days after that call, when U.S. District Judge Marc Thomas Treadwell denied the state’s motion to dismiss in Diamond v. Owens et. al on September 14. Treadwell’s decision, while not a final judgment, does pave the way for Diamond’s case to proceed to discovery and trial, according to a court filing provided to The Advocate by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Diamond, 37 and originally from Rome, was released from Augusta State Medical Prison August 31 after facing a harrowing three years of incarceration at various Georgia prisons, where, she alleges, she was repeatedly physically and sexually assaulted, interned at men’s facilities despite her female gender identity, relocated after receiving threats, denied medically necessary health care, and subjected to pronounced, near-daily verbal harassment.
Originally given an 11-year sentence for a conviction of nonviolent burglary and theft, Diamond explains that her parole could last eight years. Her hometown of Rome is the largest town on the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. But, she explains:
“It’s still a small town in the Deep South, a former cotton-port town that has never been right to black or trans people or anybody different. Being raised in the Deep South, I have enough experience with prejudice to know that it still exists. Rome feels a long way from Atlanta. If you can’t make it to a big city, then you’re spinning your wheels here, and trying to make an income is hard so you get into trouble just to try to make it, and now I am back here on parole.”
Diamond’s experience of feeling trapped in a small town in the Deep South resembles that of Alena Bradford, another low-to-no income black trans woman whose story of living in Albany, Ga., gained attention following a July 24 article in U.K. newspaper The Guardian. Transgender people, be they incarcerated or not, face profound obstacles in Southern states, where there are still few laws that protect them from discrimination in housing and employment, few statutes to address hate crimes, and few avenues to obtain affirming, competent health care, as the Human Rights Campaign’s interactive Maps of State Laws and Policies makes clear.
Speaking to The Advocate, Diamond details the excruciating, multifaceted harm she experienced while continually denied hormone therapy, which she had been on for nearly two decades before she was incarcerated:
“When they denied me [hormone therapy] I felt more than anxiety attacks. I felt physical pain, pain from watching your body morph, withdrawing, and those are medical problems. There were times I felt like I would die, when guards dragged me on pavement to solitary [confinement].”
And Diamond’s struggle for humane, adequate care isn’t unique to trans women housed in Georgia’s correctional system. The Advocate continues to follow the case of Ky Peterson, a black trans man from rural Americus, Ga., who is serving a questionably timed sentence for killing his rapist, has been repeatedly denied access to his own medically necessary transition-related care, and was often placed in solitary confinement.
Diamond’s early release marked a breakthrough in her struggle against the Georgia Department of Corrections, prison reform advocates noted. Although her claims of discrimination and violations of her Eighth Amendment rights got a helping hand from the Department of Justice in April when the federal agency issued a statement supporting her claims, her early release was nearly unprecedented.
“According to Georgia’s State Board of Pardons and Paroles, it is rare for inmates to actually be granted parole at their initial eligibility date, and even less common for inmates to be released early, as is the case with Ms. Diamond, who was released several months before her initial eligibility date in November 2015,” explains Chinyere Ezie, an SPLC staff attorney who is representing Diamond. “This date changed inexplicably to July earlier this month.”
When asked if Diamond’s early parole might be considered a tacit acknowledgment by the Georgia Department of Corrections that it cannot adequately and safely house trans inmates, Ezie is straightforward.
“Although the department has made statements to the contrary, that is precisely what we believe,” Ezie says in an email exchange with The Advocate. “It hardly seems like a coincidence that Ashley’s release came days after we filed papers with the court highlighting the Georgia Department of Corrections’ continued failings and unwillingness to provide Ashley and other transgender inmates safe and appropriate housing or adequate medical care, as the Constitution requires.”
Now,Ezie expects to take full advantage of Judge Treadwell’s rejection of the state’s attempt to dismiss Diamond’s case, pressing on with the lawsuit vigorously. “SPLC’s advocacy on behalf of Ashley Diamond and transgender inmates like her is far from over,” Ezie promises The Advocate. “Our lawsuit against the Georgia Department of Corrections is still ongoing, and we are monitoring the experiences of other transgender inmates currently incarcerated in Georgia, who woefully remain without care. Because the abuses we are seeing are pursuant to patterns or practices within the department, we have not ruled out seeking further intervention — both from the court and the Department of Justice.”
For her part, even while her movement is limited in her small Georgia hometown, Diamond is clear about her mission. “Why is this lawsuit important?” she asks rhetorically. “So what happened to me never happens again.”
Cleis Abeni
www.advocate.com/transgender/2015/9/29/after-three-years-jailed-men-ashley-diamond-speaks
Find out about Cincinnati’s new LGBTI marketing push
Find out about Cincinnati’s new LGBTI marketing push
The Cincinnatti USA Convention and Visitors Bureau is launching a new LGBTI marketing plan to attract more gay tourism to the Ohio city.
According to the Cincinnati Business Courier, the organization has hired David Ziegler, a former ticketing director of the Cincinnati Reds, as its new national sales manager.
Ziegler, who started his new role in January, will oversee the city’s attendance at three LGBTI market conferences, and its first ‘Love Wins Weekend.’
According to the publication, the CVB is also working with hotels in the region to make them TAG approved – meaning they meet certain LGBTI friendly criteria. So far, hotels such as the Westin Cincinnati, the Kingsgate Marriott Conference Center and the Cincinnatian have received the certification.
The CVB is also a member of the International Gay and Lesbian Travel Association.
The post Find out about Cincinnati’s new LGBTI marketing push appeared first on Gay Star News.
Jamie Tabberer
www.gaystarnews.com/article/find-out-about-cincinnatis-new-lgbti-marketing-push/
Don't Ask Matt Damon or Tom Hardy About Their Sexuality (Unless It Involves Their Wives)
Don't Ask Matt Damon or Tom Hardy About Their Sexuality (Unless It Involves Their Wives)
Openly straight Matt Damon doesn’t think actors should talk about their sexuality. Meanwhile, Tom Hardy feels similarily, especially when the questions apply to him.
During a round of press promoting Legend, Hardy’s new film in which he plays real-life gangster twins Ronnie and Reggie Kray, a reporter from an LGBT publication did the unthinkable — he asked Hardy if he found it difficult for celebrities to discuss their sexuality, obliquely referencing a 2008 interview in which Hardy said he had been intimate with men.
“What on earth are you on about?” Hardy snapped. “I don’t find it difficult for celebrities to talk about their sexuality. Are you asking about my sexuality? … Why?”
Hardy shut down the reporter and swiftly moved on to other questions. The exchange was uncomfortable and left many questions. So Hardy later explained why the question was off-putting.
“I’m under no obligation to share anything to do with my family, my children, my sexuality — that’s nobody’s business but my own,” Hardy told The Daily Beast. “…It’s important destigmatizing sexuality and gender inequality in the workplace, but to put a man on the spot in a room full of people designed purely for a salacious reaction? To be quite frank, it’s rude. If he’d have said that to me in the street, I’d have said the same thing back: ‘I’m sorry, who the fuck are you?’”
It’s not incomprehensible that the reporter would ask about Hardy’s sexuality. After all, Hardy had said he had been intimate with people of the same gender (although he kind of took it back). Additionally, since one of the twins he plays in his latest film is portrayed as gay (some historians say both twins were in fact bisexual), it makes perfect sense that Hardy would be asked about his sexuality by someone writing from an LGBT publication. However, Hardy was having none of it. And that’s what’s truly off-putting.
Hardy responded as if he was asked a dark secret and the Internet wrongfully praised his response. There is nothing shameful about being LGBT, and by stating that the question is “rude,” Hardy is implying that sexual orientation, at least a nonheterosexual orientation, is something that should not be discussed. He’s implying that sexual orientation should remain hidden. Our sexual orientation is an integral part of who we are. Why is Hardy trying to hide it?
Few male celebs have opened up about being attracted to more than one gender. A few — like Alan Cumming — have proudly used the word “bisexual.” However, most of Hollywood’s leading men are, at least publicly, gay or straight. Few men are openly in between. Where are all the sexually fluid men in Hollywood?
Hardy never said he was heterosexual. He didn’t say it in the initial interview or in any of his follow-up comments He never fully took back his 2008 comments either. He just said that his past experiences as a young adult with people of the same gender shouldn’t be reflected over his current life choices.
Hardy may have experimented as a young adult and found that it wasn’t his thing. Or he could be bisexual and uncomfortable discussing his sexuality (especially since he’s currently married to a woman). Whatever the case may be — so what? Why can’t he discuss it openly? Is he uncomfortable discussing it? If so, why?
Sexuality is far from a private matter, even for ostensibly private people like Matt Damon, who often poses with his wife on red carpets. Heterosexuals are given spaces to publicly express their sexuality every day, from the rings on their fingers to holding hands in the street. Heterosexuality is prominently and fearlessly displayed, and queer sexualities should receive the same treatment. Straight men and women shouldn’t be the only ones allowed to have their sexuality be public.
Asking Hardy a question on his sexuality — as opposed to his sex life — should not be offensive. But we seem to have a problem when things aren’t entirely gay or straight — or, in Damon’s case, not straight. When someone’s sexuality lands on the bisexual spectrum, almost all individuals fear saying too much.
It’s 2015, and men who have been with other men as well as women still have a nearly impossible time discussing it. There is an idea with heterosexual men that once you are intimate with a man, your attraction to women is no longer valid. Obviously, this idea is false and deeply rooted in biphobia. Men who have experimented with men should be able to talk about their sexuality as well as men who realize they’re attracted to both men and women.
Hardy admits he could have handled the situation better, by addressing the question head on. He could have answered that he’s straight, that he’ bi, or that his experimentation with men was just that — experimentation. Sexuality should never be subject that is avoided out of privacy, or worse, shame. Society will only accept sexually queer folk once celebrities like Hardy are forthcoming when asked questions about their orientation or people like Damon truly understand their privilege. But when people like Hardy deflect, it perpetuates the idea that being anything other than straight is in some way private and shameful.
Hardy messed up because there is only one wrong answer when asked about your sexual orientation: silence.
ELIEL CRUZ is a contributor to The Advocate on bisexuality. His work has also been found in Religion News Service, The Huffington Post, Mic, Sojourners, The Washington Post, Patheos, Everyday Feminism, Details, Rolling Stone, Vice, and Slate. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter.
Eliel Cruz
Tunisia’s Justice Minister backs repeal of gay sex ban
Tunisia’s Justice Minister backs repeal of gay sex ban
A case where a 22-year-old student was sentenced to a year’s jail after his same-sex relationship was uncovered as part of a murder investigation has prompted Tunisian Justice Minister Mohamed Salah Ben Aissa to comment on the future of the country’s anti-sodomy law.
The unnamed student was arrested on 6 September in the resort city of Sousse after his number was found on the body of a man he had been sleeping with.
He denied any involvement in the killing but confessed his relationship with the deceased to explain his connection to him.
Authorities believed his story after subjecting him to a medical examination but handed him over to prosecutors as a result of his confession.
The case provoked outcry by human rights groups both inside and outside Tunisia including Human Rights Watch (HRW), prompting the group’s deputy Middle East and North Africa director Eric Goldstein to call out the Tunisian Government over the continued use of the law.
‘The Tunisian government should not be prosecuting people for private and consensual sexual acts,’ Goldstein said on Monday.
‘If Tunisia truly aspires to be a regional leader on human rights, it should lead the way in decriminalizing homosexual conduct.’
Goldstein also warned against the use of so-called medical tests to ‘prove’ a person’s homosexuality.
‘Medical professionals who participate in forced anal examinations of people suspected of homosexuality violate medical ethics and facilitate serious miscarriages of justice,’ Goldstein said.
Reacting on a non-state owned radio station, Justice Minister Mohamed Salah Ben Aissa addressed the issue, saying he was personally in favor of scrapping the law.
‘My problem is Article 230 … Nothing can justify infringement on private life,’ Ben Aissa said, according to reports.
Consensual sex acts between males in Tunisia can attract sentences of up to three years in prison.
The post Tunisia’s Justice Minister backs repeal of gay sex ban appeared first on Gay Star News.
Andrew Potts
www.gaystarnews.com/article/tunisias-justice-minister-backs-repeal-of-gay-sex-ban/
Meet The 2015 MacArthur Fellows
Meet The 2015 MacArthur Fellows
Once a year, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation announces its roster of MacArthur Fellows, a designation frequently referred to as the “Genius Grant.” The fellowship bestows upon its recipients a $625,000 prize, along with an accolade that manages to celebrate innovative minds across fields, from science to poetry to painting, and just about everything in between.
This year, the list of MacArthur Fellows ranges from a celebrated writer to an environmental advocate to an inorganic chemist, varying in age from 33 to 72 years old. In total, there are 15 men and nine women represented. The recipients were aware of their award before the 12 a.m. announcement by the MacArthur Foundation this Tuesday. Nonetheless, the winners are celebrating publicly now that the news is out.
Dear age 40,
I win.
Sincerely,
Ta-Nehisi
— Ta-Nehisi Coates (@tanehisicoates) September 29, 2015
“These 24 delightfully diverse MacArthur Fellows are shedding light and making progress on critical issues, pushing the boundaries of their fields, and improving our world in imaginative, unexpected ways,” MacArthur President Julia Stasch explains on the MacArthur Foundation website. “Their work, their commitment, and their creativity inspire us all.”
The MacArthur Fellowship, founded in 1978, is given out annually to a group of high-achieving individuals in disciplines as diverse as dance, computer science and adaptive design. What was once a $50,000 award has since morphed into a six-figure prize. Past winners include author Cormac McCarthy, photographer Cindy Sherman and astrophysicist Joseph Taylor.
Check out a full-list of the 2015 Fellows below.
1. Patrick Awuah (Education Entrepreneur)
The 50-year-old founder and president of Ashesi University College was chosen for his efforts in building a new model of higher education in his home country of Ghana. He was an engineer and program manager at Microsoft before he began the university in 2002.
2. Kartik Chandran (Environmental Engineer)
An associate professor in the Earth and Environmental Department of Columbia University, the 41-year-old New York native integrates microbial ecology, molecular biology and engineering to update the process of wastewater treatment.
3. Ta-Nehisis Coates (Journalist)
The MacArthur Foundation praised the 39-year-old national correspondent at The Atlantic in Washington, D.C., for bringing “personal reflection and historical scholarship to bear on America’s most contested issues,” namely through his longform essay titled “The Case for Reparations,” as well as his two books The Beautiful Struggle and Between the World and Me.
4. Gary Cohen (Environmental Health Advocate)
The 59-year-old co-founder and president of Health Care Without Harm focuses on the environmental impact of American hospitals. The Virginia resident engages environmental scientists, medical professionals and institutions in discussions of sustainability and climate change as they are related to health care.
5. Matthew Desmond (Urban Sociologist)
The 35-year-old associate professor of sociology and social studies at Harvard University studies the impact of eviction on the lives of the urban poor. The Massachusetts-based creator of the Milwaukee Area Renters Study looks specifically at the low-income rental market in the largest city in Wisconsin, noting “that households headed by women are more likely to face eviction than men, resulting in deleterious long-term effects much like those caused by high rates of incarceration among low-income African American men.”
6. William Dichtel (Chemist)
A 37-year-old associate professor of chemistry and chemical biology at Cornell University in New York, he is celebrated for his work assembling molecules into high surface-area networks that are beneficial in the fields of electronics, optics and energy storage.
7. Michelle Dorrance (Tap Dancer and Choreographer)
The 36-year-old founder and artistic director of Dorrance Dance in New York has been heralded for combining traditions from tap dance with the choreographic nuances of contemporary dance in works like “SOUNDspace,” “The Blues Project,” and “ETM: The Initial Approach.”
8. Nicole Eisenman (Painter)
The 50-year-old painter from New York explores themes like gender and sexuality, family dynamics, and the inequalities of wealth and power in her narrative and rhetorical works that span from painting and sculpture to drawing and printmaking.
9. LaToya Ruby Frazier (Photographer and Video Artist)
The 33-year-old assistant professor of photography at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago mixes self-portraiture with social narrative to construct visual autobiographies that emphasize the connection between her notions of “self” and “space.”
10. Ben Lerner (Writer)
A 36-year-old professor in the Department of English at City University of New York, Brooklyn College, Lerner’s work moves between fiction and nonfiction in an attempt to investigate the “relevance of art and the artist to modern culture.”
11. Mimi Lien (Set Designer)
The 39-year-old set designer from New York creates architecturally dramatic sets for theater, opera and dance, such as her full-scale Tsarist Russian salon in “Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812.”
12. Lin-Manuel Miranda (Playwright, Composer and Performer)
The 35-year-old playwright, composer and performer from New York has been honored for expanding the possibilities of musical theater for individuals and communities new to Broadway stages, particularly in his work “In The Heights,” which tells the story of an immigrant community losing its neighborhood to gentrification.
13. Dimitri Nakassis (Classicist)
An associate professor of in the Department of Classics at the University of Toronto, the 40-year-old classicist is transforming our understanding of prehistoric Greek societies, challenging the long-held view that Late Bronze Age Mycenaean palatial society (1400 to 1200 BC) was a highly centralized oligarchy, distinct from the democratic city-states of classical Greece.
14. John November (Computational Biologist)
The 37-year-old associate professor of human genetics at the University of Chicago is discovering news ways of viewing human evolutionary history, population structure and migration, and the etiology of genetic diseases.
15. Christopher Ré (Computer Scientist)
The 36-year-old assistant professor of computer science at Stanford University is “democratizing” big data analytics using his training in databases and expertise in machine learning to ultimately create an inference engine dubbed DeepDive.
16. Marina Rustow (Historian)
The 46-year-old professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University in New Jersey is notable for her work using the Cairo Geniza texts to draw new conclusions about Jewish life in the medieval Middle East.
17. Juan Salgado (Community Leader)
The 46-year-old president and CEO of Instituto del Progreso Latina in Chicago is praised for his work helping low-income immigrants succeed in the workplace and participate in education programs that equip workers with the skills they need for higher-paying employment.
18. Beth Stevens (Neuroscientist)
The 45-year-old assistant professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School in Massachusetts studies microglial cells and the origins of adult neurological diseases.
19. Lorenz Studer (Stem Cell Biologist)
Studer is the 49-year-old director of the Center for Stem Cell Biology at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York who’s credited with a breakthrough in dopaminergic neurons that could provide treatment for Parkinson’s disease, and possibly other neurodegenerative conditions.
20. Alex Truesdell (Adaptive Designer and Fabricator)
A 59-year-old executive director and founder of Adaptive Design Association, Inc., the New York resident creates low-tech and affordable tools that help children with disabilities in everyday activities in their homes, schools and communities.
21. Basil Twist (Puppetry Artist and Director)
The 46-year-old puppetry artist from New York is known for his 1998 production, “Symphonie Fantastique,” which consisted of an hour-long performance of feathers, glitter, plastics, vinyl, mirrors, slides, dyes, blacklight, overhead projections, air bubbles, and latex fishing lures.
22. Ellen Bryant Voigt (Poet)
The 72-year-old poet from Virginia has published eight collections of poetry that challenge “will and fate and the life cycles of the natural world while exploring the expressive potential of both lyric and narrative elements.”
23. Heidi Williams (Economist)
The 34-year-old assistant professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology focuses on the causes and effects of innovation within health care markets, revealing how the timing and nature of intellectual property restrictions can affect change in the field.
24. Peidong Yang (Inorganic Chemist)
The 44-year-old Professor of Energy in the Department of Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, specializes in semiconductor nanowires and their practical applications, such as in the conversion of waste heat into electricity.
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