In 2011 Janice McAlpine and Renée van Weringh proposed that they work with Queen's University Archives to establish and develop an archival collection pertaining to the Kingston Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer 2 Spirited community. Documentation ... »
In 2011 Janice McAlpine and Renée van Weringh proposed that they work with Queen's University Archives to establish and develop an archival collection pertaining to the Kingston Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer 2 Spirited community. Documentation of gay and lesbian life has been scant. Lesbians and gay men have often destroyed or concealed records of same-sex relationships, and when they have not, family and society at large have frequently stepped in posthumously to expunge the evidence. The resulting dearth of information about queer lives has made growing up and coming out difficult for the LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, transsexual, two-spirited, and queer) contingent of each generation. This is not a recent problem or a local one, but it is one with local implications: although some large centres have lesbian and gay archives, such as Toronto’s Lesbian and Gay Archives, the regional record of gay and lesbian life in Canada is almost nonexistent.
The Stonewall Riots in New York City, which are thought to mark the beginning of the modern North American gay rights movement, occurred in 1969. By the early 1970s, lesbians and gay men in Kingston were beginning to create social and support groups. ... »
The Stonewall Riots in New York City, which are thought to mark the beginning of the modern North American gay rights movement, occurred in 1969. By the early 1970s, lesbians and gay men in Kingston were beginning to create social and support groups. The youth of the 1970s are the seniors of today. Papers related to early local gay and lesbian organizing and culture will likely soon be lost unless a concerted effort is made to gather them now. We’ve chosen 2010 as the closing date for our collection period partly for convenience—it brings us almost to the present—but also because of social networking websites such as Facebook. Most local information intended for an audience of gay men or lesbians is now disseminated primarily through the Internet, and increasingly through these networks. They have changed the way politico-cultural organizing is done around the world. Online social networking has created a new type of semi-private/semi-public social space that is highly resistant to traditional socio-political control. Thus, our collection period is designed to coincide with the era of print primacy, and an era when public outreach entailed putting up posters in physical rather than, or as well as, virtual space.
