Working with the South Texas Equality Project (STEP), SMU anthropology graduate student and 2024 Maguire Public Service Fellow Sara Beth Becker is amplifying the voices and stories of the Rio Grande Valley’s queer community, contributing to a broader understanding and appreciation of their resilience and efforts to carve out spaces of acceptance and joy. “I want to get a first-hand perspective of the important work that they are doing as one of the most active organizations supporting the Valley queer community,” she says. By participating in STEP’s efforts, Sara Beth aims to give back to the community she studies. She believes in the reciprocal nature of research, where her findings can help the community while she also contributes to ongoing initiatives. “There are also things that I can be doing now with my time and energy, alongside STEP and countless other people, to make the Valley a better place for everyone to live,” she emphasizes.
Growing up near the Valley in Corpus Christi, Sara Beth observed the region’s struggles with representation and resource allocation. This proximity and familiarity inspired her research into the vibrant and active queer community in the Valley, a community she found both surprising and inspiring given the cultural challenges. “I am interested in the ways that people carve out spaces to live good lives, despite the opposition or apathy of the world around them,” she explains. “I wanted to know more about what they are doing and how they are doing it.” Sara Beth’s research aims to uncover the intricate networks of exchange that underpin efforts to build better lives, such as the organization of Pride events. “It takes a lot of time, money, and good old-fashioned sweat and blood for something like Pride to happen,” she notes. By studying the resources available in the Valley and their impact on events such as Pride, Sara Beth hopes to shed light on how these cultural touchpoints are shaped and sustained.
Sara Beth employs a meticulous approach to documenting and analyzing her observations and interviews. “I document my observations by taking quick notes while I’m out in the field,” she explains. These notes are expanded upon once she returns home. Interviews are audio-recorded and transcribed, with the recordings deleted afterward to protect the informants’ privacy. “I treat these notes and interviews like texts, analyzing them to find patterns and themes,” Sara Beth says. Her goal is to present her findings at conferences and publish a paper that contributes to the understanding of queer communities in the Valley.
For Sara Beth, community well-being in the context of her research means “feeling safe, confident, and welcome and knowing that people are fighting for you.” The Valley, with its disproportionate struggles with poverty and violence, especially impacts its queer residents. Pride events, while not a solution to all these issues, provide a crucial affirmation of community and a safe space for expression. “Pride is not a magic bullet for these ills, but it is an opportunity for people to confirm that they have a community and that their community does have places it can exist without fear of violence,” Sara Beth elaborates. Pride, for the queer community in the Valley, represents more than just a celebration. “Pride is a way of being, a community, and a form of activism,” Sara Beth said. “Pride represents an imagined future of happiness made present, a promise to those watching that it will be OK.”