I’ve been teaching for over twenty years and I regularly offer workshops and presentations to universities, organisations and grassroots community groups. Read more about my recent work.
For more information about booking a workshop or other event, please get in touch.

I’m currently offering the following workshops (online and in person):

Introduction to intersectionality

Intersectionality is everywhere. But what does it mean to keep intersectionality at the core of our work? How can we turn theory into practice without falling back on tokenism?

Queer ecology: in the park

Cities can be intense – fast, noisy, full of human activity. But can they also be places of stillness? Of connection with the nature all around (and inside) us? Of story-telling, bingo and picnics?

Queer ecology: Interconnected

The systems destroying the environment are often the same as those that exploit and oppress queer people. Climate change, queerphobia, resistance, liberation. It’s all connected.

Queer ecology: stories

The stories we tell about human and non-human nature have the power to change everything – not only how we live in relation to the environment but also how we treat each other.

Writing from the margins

For the last seven years I’ve been holding spaces for marginalised writers to come together, to share challenges – and solutions – and to deepen our craft.

WFTM: the places we love

In this workshop we will explore the precious places that cause us to breathe deep. The mountains and rivers and the overgrown corners of car parks. We will find out what happens if we write down our dreams for the places, and beings, we love.

Get in touch to book a workshop

Cities can be intense - fast, noisy, full of human activity. But can they also be places of stillness? Of connection with the nature all around (and inside) us? Berlin is full of queer bars, events, protests and spaces - what about non-human queerness? What stories of life are we missing as we race across the city to our next appointment?

Our adventure is in three parts. The first is an introduction and some stories from queer ecologist and community organiser, Kes Otter Lieffe.  The second part is a collective game of Queer Animals and Plants bingo! You will receive a bingo card (based on Kes’ colouring book series) and together we’ll find the species listed and hear some stories of their perhaps surprisingly queer lives. We’ll end with an optional picnic on the grass - bring food and drinks to share if you like and we’ll get to know each other a bit better.

This tour was designed for Berlin but can be adapted to any other urban area - get in touch if you'd like to host a tour in your city or town!

The systems destroying the environment are often the same as those that exploit and oppress LGBTQIA+ people. Environmental devastation and queer precarity are bound together.

Just as we experience increased risks of violence, poverty, and marginalisation, we are also more exposed to the harms of a wrecked environment such as climate disasters and pandemics. As we experience reduced access to stable work, housing, or healthcare, we also lack access to land and the benefits of healthy ecosystems.

While oppressions of various kinds share common roots, so do our struggles for liberation. The fights to defend the environment and the struggles for queer liberation – as well as countless other movements - are intimately interconnected.

Worldwide, grassroots communities are creating projects and movements that offer alternatives to mainstream sustainable development. Queer solidarity and liberation are combined with environmental connection, defence and restoration as an everyday praxis. Further exploration of these queer environmental networks can prove instructive for finding alternative models that centre the needs of the most marginalised in our communities.

The stories we tell about human and non-human nature have the power to change everything - not only how we live in relation to the environment but also how we treat each other.

What narratives have we been taught about the living world and what are the effects of those stories on our lives? Could queer ecology have a role in supporting marginalised communities? In which ways can learning about nature strengthen our movements for solidarity and survival?

Testimonial: 

Queer Ecology Keynote, 2024
"Kes was the keynote speaker at our annual Sustainability Summer School, where she captivated us with stories that dismantled enduring myths about human and non-human animals. Through heartwarming storytelling, she introduced a diverse group of students to the concept of queer ecology. For a summer school focused on transformative futures, this was a truly essential and inspiring contribution. Kes’s calm and natural presentation style made the time fly by, leaving a lasting impression. It was a memorable lecture that we undoubtedly recommend. Working with Kes was a pleasure, and we are truly grateful for the experience."
Femke Feys, Green Office Ghent

Since releasing my second novel in 2018, I've been holding spaces for marginalised writers to come together, to share challenges - and solutions - and to deepen our craft. I've taught 'Writing from the Margins' in various formats, as a weekly course over several months and as one-off classes. We've covered subjects that include: writing marginalised characters, land and setting the scene, writing utopias and world-building.

Get in touch if you would like to host a Writing from the Margins workshop or course.

Testimonial:

Trans Ecology Writing workshop, 2023
"I attended a writing workshop with Kes exploring relationships with place and speculative futures. Kes is a skilled facilitator, guiding us through each writing exercise and extending care around all aspects of the process - we were invited to join her in breathing exercises and in doing simple stretches after each period of focused writing, which I've never experienced at a writing workshop before! The environments Kes creates feel genuinely engaged and compassionate, and she is attentive to the complicated feelings that can arise in using writing to explore the futures we want and hope for."
Felix McNulty, cofounder of Books Beyond Bars UK

Queer and trans life is, for a large part, an urban one. We gather for our safety, and cities can be the building sites for our communities and livelihoods. But there, surrounded by cement and trees in boxes, we can lose touch with the land, if we ever had it to lose. We lose touch and we touch loss for the five billion other species who are also our community. But what if our transness, our queerness, our divergence, and our power, is a call to connect? What if that connection could redefine who we are?

In this workshop we will explore the precious places that cause us to breathe deep. The mountains and rivers and the overgrown corners of car parks. We will find out what happens if we write down our dreams for the places, and beings, we love. Participation in this creative workshop will be by consent: sharing our stories is invited, but never mandatory. The workshop will be focused on writing, but feel free to use whatever medium brings you the deepest joy.

Testimonial:

Trans Ecology Writing workshop, 2023
"We invited Kes Otter Lieffe as a keynote to our Trans Ecologies Symposium, a fully sold-out event attended by 75 participants over two days. Kes ran a thoughtful, fluent, and powerfully moving workshop on speculative trans ecological fiction – It all starts with the land – in which we reflected together on the crucial roles of sensation and imagination in radical change work that aims to take account of more-than-human agencies. Her genuine, personal, and inclusive approach helped set the tone for the entire symposium, and participant feedback mentioned the workshop as a highlight. We definitely would work with Kes again!"
Sage Brice, University of Durham