Category: 2010s

  • Black, Lesbian, and Still Here: Tori’s story

    Black, Lesbian, and Still Here: Tori’s story

    As a little Black girl growing up in small-town Georgia, USA, I was told to go to church and respect my elders, even if they were wrong. I was supposed to get good grades in school and, once I graduated from high school, find a husband and have kids. That’s what they call happiness in…

  • Lesbian fetishism is not lesbian acceptance!

    Lesbian fetishism is not lesbian acceptance!

    Lesbian fetishism is a power move resulting from the tension of uncertainty between hatred and acceptance. A trained attack dog, running on conditioned hate, will chase blood in the enemy. But there’s a space between the attack and the dog lying on its back in acceptance of its surroundings. Lesbian fetishism, like the fetishism of…

  • Flamboyance and Fortitude: Butch-Femme Relationships in 2024

    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?

  • Why ‘Blue is the Warmest Color’ is a shit film

    Why ‘Blue is the Warmest Color’ is a shit film

    ‘Blue is the Warmest Color’ is a shit film and here’s why.

  • Is lesbian separatism possible in 2023?

    Is lesbian separatism possible in 2023?

    Q&A style posts on LesbianHerstory.com are an opportunity for readers to ask questions that serve as prompting topics for LH to write about. Questions can be advice-based, about our hot takes, asking whether we’ll cover a certain event or figure from history, or about lesbian news and media – you name it. Send your questions/prompts…

  • Boston Marriages and the Language of Lesbian Relationships

    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 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

    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…

  • Patricia Highsmith: a Painful Lesson

    Patricia Highsmith: a Painful Lesson

    Patricia Highsmith was the author of The Price of Salt (1952): the inspiration for the film Carol (2015). It was the first lesbian novel with a happy ending. However, while many adored her, Patricia Highsmith was not known as a particularly cheerful person. The prolific author wrote 22 novels and many short stories over her…