Category: 1920s
-
Kunstmuseum Basel exhibits ‘The First Homosexuals’
While it can feel like the world is moving away from labels, naming something makes it more visible. Switzerland’s Kunstmuseum Basel is proving the power of specific language by exhibiting the compelling art made by and for gay and lesbian people immediately after the word “homosexual” was coined in 1869. Homosexuals existed before there was…
-
Lesbian Visibility Week is for female homosexuals
Lesbianism has been made invisible for a variety of homophobic reasons. Heteropatriarchal society denied that female homosexuality was possible in history, which is the epitome of invisibility. But is today much different? Lesbians can’t even have Lesbian Visibility Week (LVW), beginning April 20, to themselves without including everyone who identifies as “queer,” or else we’re…
-
Flamboyance and Fortitude: Butch-Femme Relationships in 2024
Butch-Femme relationships play an important role in lesbian history. What does the Butch-Femme relationship mean today?
-
Boston Marriages and the Language of Lesbian Relationships
Maybe it was two women in your history textbook. Maybe it was your unmarried great aunt and her live-in ‘best friend’. We are all familiar with the story: two women are designated close friends by historians, family members and society, despite the pair’s decision to unite and entwine their lives like any marriage between a…
-
How Should We Tell the Stories of “Bad” Lesbians from History in a Culture of Us vs. Them?
How do we write on complex, even harmful, lesbians from history in the age of “us vs. them”? How do we present the facts in a way that doesn’t omit the person or the truth? Is writing on a person from history ever objective, considering the historian has their own interests, motives and interpretations, and…
-
The Male Gaze and Lesbian Censorship in Film
It’s of little surprise to most sapphic movie buffs that Hollywood doesn’t have the best track record when it comes to positive lesbian representation. From the widespread trope of “bury your gays” to the equally widespread phenomenon of gay-baiting, it can be hard out there for a film loving dyke. Hays Code A lot of…