Trans History | LGBTQ Oral History Digital Collaboratory

All posts filed under: Trans History

Back, Back, Back Again! A Snapshot of Sapphic Aquatica, the New (New) Pussy Palace

November 14, 2023

The Pussy Palace is back! Sort of. In November 2022, the club that hosted the Pussy Palace relaunched the pre-pandemic women and trans bathhouse night called, uh...Sapphic Aquatica? Held in the same historic bathhouse as the Pussy Palace, the pansexual swinger’s club, Oasis Aqualounge, ran another monthly women and trans bathhouse event from 2012-2019. Thought to be yet another permanent pandemic casualty, the party is back, back, back again in yet another form with the same fishy name.

This is Halloween (On Church!)

October 31, 2023

by Atticus Hawk

Activist Histories / Drag / Gay History / Queer History / The Gays Did What Now? / Trans History

It’s Gay Christmas, y’all! For decades, Toronto’s Gay Village has transformed into a massive, costumed block party for Halloween. But why? Learn about the legendary Halloween Drag Balls in the city, the clock tower that we’ve all forgotten, and the deeply Trans history of the one night a year you can dress as your true self, and no one can ding you for it.

Special Issue Release! Trans Histories by Trans Historians

October 20, 2023

by Jamey Jesperson and Chris Aino Pihlak

Academia / Oral History / Publishing / Trans History

Trans histories by trans historians are important. But with only a handful of trans history books and not a single academic journal dedicated to trans pasts, there are vast temporal, thematic, and geographical gaps in our histories. As two trans feminine graduate students in history at the University of Victoria, we set out to change that. In the summer of 2021, we took up editorship of our department’s peer-reviewed, graduate-student journal, The Graduate History Review, […]

Public Event! Trans Histories in Canada and Germany: A Roundtable Discussion

September 13, 2023

by Alisha Stranges

Academia / Collaboratory News / Trans History

Did you know that October is Canada's official LGBTQ2S+ History Month? To mark the occasion, we invite you to join us on Monday, October 2, 2023 for a moderated roundtable discussion about current trends, challenges, and interventions in the research and study of trans histories in both Canada and Germany, featuring visiting historical scholars from Freie Universität Berlin and graduate students in history at the University of Toronto.

ONSTAGE/OFFSTAGE: A Conversation with Curator Jordan King

September 8, 2023

by Juan Carlos Mezo-González

Activist Histories / Public Exhibition / Public Humanities / Queer History / Trans History

An upcoming multi-media exhibition at the The ArQuives — Canada’s LGBTQ2+ archives — brings a new lens into the queer history of 20th century Canadian nightlife. Titled “ONSTAGE/OFFSTAGE,” the exhibition explores “the ways stage performance in nightclubs, cabarets, and drag venues offered opportunities for self-actualization for gender fluid, trans, and gender non-binary individuals in the second half of the 20th Century.” The curator, Jordan King, is a multi-disciplinary artist, performer, and writer who is currently […]

A Conversation with Dr. Alex Ketchum about her Directory of LGBTQ+ Archives

July 21, 2023

by Juan Carlos Mezo-González

Archiving Oral History / Gay History / Lesbian History / Public Humanities / Trans History

Having a good sense of the LGBTQ+ archives and resources available in North America has been crucial in my scholarship. My doctoral project on the history of gay periodicals led me to a number of these repositories, which included both physical and online spaces. Yet the increasing number of queer archives and the occasional changes...