Bleach and Water: The AIDS Crisis and Preserving Queer History in Pittsburgh

Join poet and historian Silas Maxwell Switzer for a talk and a reading from Nine Parts Water, One Part Bleach, a documentary poetry collection exploring the AIDS crisis in Pittsburgh. Blending archival research and lyric memory, Silas traces the stories that survive and the silences that remain. The evening will reflect on how queer histories are remembered — or erased — in Pittsburgh’s cultural memory.

Silas Maxwell Switzer is a queer scholar and poet. In 2023, he published his docupoetry chapbook, Nine Parts Water, One Part Bleach, chronicling the local history of the AIDS crisis in Pittsburgh. Silas has an essay in the journal Queer Studies in Media and Popular Culture analyzing the queer worldbuilding in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He has also been published in Lunch Ticket and Waxing & Waning. When he isn’t buried in the archives or writing poetry, Silas enjoys contemplating the mysteries of American urban fauna, particularly the noble possum.