A Systematic Review of LGBTQ+ Events: Community, Consumerism, and Cultural Politics

LGBTQ+ events - such as Pride parades, festivals, and queer cultural gatherings – are growing in visibility and significance worldwide. These events serve multiple roles for attendees and hosts alike: as affirming spaces for LGBTQ+ communities, platforms for identity expression, tourist attractions, and flashpoints for political and social contestation. Despite their cross-sectoral importance, research on LGBTQ+ events is fragmented across disciplines. This systematic literature review consolidates findings from 104 peer-reviewed studies spanning 1995–2024 with a focus on LGBTQ+ events. The review identifies two overarching thematic domains: Consumer and the Events and Society and the Events. Subthemes highlight LGBTQ+ events as intersections of identity, sources of benefit and hostility, sites of commodification, mirrors to systemic inequality, and catalysts for change. While these events often affirm LGBTQ+ identities and build community, concerns around safety, inclusion, and commercialization persist. Of particular relevance to bisexuality scholarship, the review shows that bisexual and other plurisexual people are frequently included under broad LGBTQ+ frameworks but are rarely centered as distinct participants, consumers, or community members. This absence matters because LGBTQ+ events may reproduce forms of bisexual invisibility, monosexism, and assumptions of gay/lesbian normativity, even when framed as inclusive spaces.