San Fernando Valley

GAY STUDIES: Recognizing gay culture as a growing subject of academic research, administrators at Cal State Northridge have chartered a campus center for gay studies.

The Institute for Lesbian, Bisexual, Gay and Transgender Studies will provide a forum for faculty and students to share their findings, said English professor Donald Hall, the institute’s co-director.

“There’s a very, very active gay and lesbian student body on campus,” Hall said. “We have no counterpart to that among the faculty and staff, so this provides a little symmetry.”

Hall operates the embryonic center out of the English department’s post-quake quarters in CSUN’s student housing complex. The institute, he said, is more a group of interested faculty than a physical research facility at the moment.

“All of that should change when we finally get back into our regular building,” he said.

Faculty members are currently creating a program of activities for the rest of the school year, with an eye toward offering round-table discussions, lectures and a student research competition, Hall said, adding that he and co-director Jan Ramjerdi would like to create an archive devoted to gay issues at CSUN and around the world.