The LGBT History Series (27) - Ethel Waters

Ethel Waters (1896-1977) was an actress and Blues singer, starting in Pennsylvania and progressing to Broadway and New York clubs. Born into astounding deprivation as the result of her 12-year old mother's rape, Waters herself was forced into marriage at 12 and divorce at 14. In her autobiography she describes herself as 'wild as a little girl, I was bad, always the leader of a streetgang in stealing and general hell-raising.'

Her first public singing performance was behind a halloween mask in the early twentieth century, but soon she was making a name and money for herself, singing professionally in Philadelphia and Baltimore.

She won an Academy Award for her supporting role in Pinky in 1949, and was recognised as the Best Actress by New York Drama Critic's Circle in 1950.

Film Screenshot, Permission: Public Domain because Copyright not renewed.
Note: Image shows Ethel Waters singing with Count Basie in Stage Door Canteen

Waters was not open about her sexual affairs with other women, other performers the graced the same stages included Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, and Alberta Hunter; all famously public about their homosexual affairs.
Waters' one public affair was with a dancer named Ethel Williams, with whom she flirted with on stage, and had notorious lovers spats with.

In the later twentieth-century, Ethel Waters toned down her performances and re-invented herself as an evangelical christian performer.

Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CountBasieEthelWatersStageDoorCanteen.jpg

The LGBT History Series (26) - The Laramie Project

'The Laramie Project' is a play by Moises Kaufman and first performed by the Tectonic Theater Company, about the reaction to and effect of the 1998 murder of Mathew Sheppard, a gay student from Laramie, Wyoming. The murder is widely believed to have been a homophobic hate-crime.

Research for the play included hundreds of interviews with inhabitants of the town, members of the the theatre companies' own diary entries, and news reports from papers and television.

The play has since been performed by schools and colleges, as well as professional theatre companies across America. I don't know of any performances in the UK or elsewhere, but comment if you do. The play is used as a GCSE English Literature text, and has also been used to teach about tolerance and prejudice in schools.

Author: Jeff Hitchcock,
Permission: Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic
Note: Image shows actors playing protestors from the Westboro Baptist Church

Famous actors who've appeared in stage performances include Jenna Ushkowitz (now in 'Glee'), Christina Ricci, Laura Linney, Peter Fonda, Camryn Manheim, Clea DuVall, and Frances Sternhagen.

In 2000, HBO commissioned Kaufman to write and direct the screenplay for the film, and it came out in 2002. Its well worth a watch, but have the tissues and the therapist handy.

'The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later' is a project is a companion piece, once again researched and performed by the Tectonic Theater Company, using interviews from many of the same people as a decade earlier, and was premiered on the 11th anniversary of Mathew Shepard's death, with an opening speech given by Glenn Close.

Queer Histories

Ladyfeatures and Gentlefolk,

As you're no doubt aware after being pummeled from every direction by such an aggressive marketing strategy, tomorrow (Friday 26th Feb) we have our much anticipated 'Queer Histories' seminar.

The event, organised to coincide with LGBT History Month, will go something like this:

4:15pm: New History Lab committee members will be poised and ready with teapots full and cake slices to hand
5:00pm: Guest speakers, Dr David Clark and Dr Holly Furneaux will present their papers ('Between Medieval Men: Male Friendship and Desire in Early Medieval English Literature' and 'Queer Dickens: Erotics, Families, Masculinities' respectively) with energy, yet heartfelt sincerity.
5:40pm-ish: Dr David Clark and Dr Holly Furneaux will buckle from the awesome might and terror of your well-thought-out questions.
6:00pm-ish: everyone (not compulsory) heads to the pub (The Marquis of Wellington), then staggers back to wherever they came from.

For those who're not familiar with our location, here is a map, we're on the left, in 1 Salisbury Road.

See you tomorrow, Mark

The LGBT History Series (25) - Marcel Jouhandeau

Marcel Jouhandeau (1888-1979) was a French writer who's life was a constant internalised battle between strict catholicism and homosexuality.

Born in Limoges; from an early age, Jouhandeau had plans to enter into the orders, but instead moved to Paris in 1908. As a young man Jouhandeau confronted his homosexuality and saw it as a great offense to god, at the same time as engaging in numerous homosexual acts.

In 1914, after pressure from the Catholic Church, Jouhandeau had a "mystical crisis" in which he burnt all his manuscripts and attempted to commit suicide. Fortunately once the crisis was over, Jouhandeau turned back to his writing.

At age 40, he married Élisabeth Toulemont who was also friends with Charles Dullin, Jean Cocteau and Max Jacob. She hoped to 'cure' him of his homosexual urgings. At this point, Jouhandeau published a work of Christian morals, before returning again to fulfil his homosexuality to the dismay of his wife. Jouhandeau documents this sexual rollercoaster in two autobiographies: Chronique d'une passion and Eloge de la volupté.

Images available here

PS. If you're reading these as they come out, you'll no doubt know by now that tomorrow is the much anticipated New History Lab: 'Queer Histories' seminar. For more information, look to the right of this article, and follow this link

The LGBT History Series (24) - Candis Cayne

And now to inject a bit more Hollywood Glamour into the Series.
Candis Cayne is a transgender actress and performing artist. Up until the 1990s, Cayne (then known as Brendan McDaniel) worked as a choreographer and drag artist, until she moved to New York, where she first heard the term 'transsexual' and realised that it corresponded with how she felt about herself.

Author: © Glenn Francis, www.PacificProDigital.com,
Permission: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0

After years of electrolysis, hormone therapy and surgery (more of which can be read about in the link below), Brendan McDaniel had become Candis Cayne.

Cayne's profile shot into the New York celebrity elite in 2007 when she played 'Carmelita' in the hit show 'Dirty Sexy Money.' This role makes her the first transgender actor to play a transgender role in a hit show.

Cayne has stated that she's 'not trying to be a spokesperson for the transgender community ... [she] just wants to be looked at as a living, breathing, happy human being'. Which in my opinion is a thoroughly healthy standpoint.

A more detailed story can be found here

CFP: Dissent and Authority (Swansea, 21-22 June)

Hosted by the Swansea University Postgraduate History Society
The Swansea University Postgraduate History Society, in conjunction with the Department of History and Classics, the Graduate Centre of the School of Arts and Humanities and the Postgraduate Research Faculty, is issuing a call for papers for its interdisciplinary Summer Symposium on the broad theme of 'Dissent and Authority'.

The programme organisers welcome proposals for 20-minute papers from postgraduate historians, classicists and literary scholars at any stage of their research. Topics might include, but are not limited to:
*The exploration of literary and visual constructions of authority and/or dissent
*Representations of personal authority
*Representations of authority and/or dissent in the context of politics or industry
*Notions of authority and/or dissent in familial or domestic spheres
*The ideology of dissenting bodies/individuals
*The outbreak of discord within state bodies

Please send a 200-250 words abstract to [email protected] in order to be considered for a paper of 20 minutes. Please also include your name, level of study, institution and research area. Proposals should be sent by no later than FRIDAY 26 MARCH at 12 noon. Proposals received after this will not be considered for inclusion except in special circumstances.
Accommodation will not be provided by the organisers, but details of local hotels will be supplied upon registration. Further details can be obtained from the conference organisers: Simon John; Tom Underwood; Catherine E. Horler.

The LGBT History Series (23) - Civil Partnership

Civil Partnerships (aka civil union, registered partnership, or domestic partnership), are a legally recognised union giving same-sex couples many of the legal rights of married couples.

In the UK, the Civil Partnership Act was passed in 2004, a similar act was passed in Australia in 2008; Ireland, Jersey and the Isle of Man all have proposed or pending acts.



There is varied opinion on the Civil Partnership Act in 2004, many organisations like the British Humanist Organisation support it on the grounds that is providing (nearly) equal rights, but a lot of religions are against it, stating that homosexuality is a sin.
Others see the act as a 'Separate but Equal' compromise, an argument resurrected from the Civil Rights Movement in 1960s America regarding racial equality. It is true that the legal status of same-sex couples who have had a civil partnership is still lower than that of married couples, which spurs people onto the belief that the Act is an entrenchment of gays as second class citizens.

On 25th July 2009, the Methodist church voted to allow their ministers to bless same-sex partnerships if they wished to. However, there was controversy later in that year when Registrar, Lillian Ladele refused to conduct a civil ceremony, because she felt it was against her Christian beliefs, was taken to court in contravention of the 2007 sexual orientation act, stating that its illegal to refuse to serve someone on account of their sexual orientation.

“Home movies can be historical treasures”

MACE were featured in The Times on Saturday with an article looking at the project Full Circle supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund. The project encourages the public to dog out their old home movies so they can be catalogued and preserved, and returned to the community, connecting the public with their local history through film.

The LGBT History Series (22) - Freddie Mercury

Freddie Mercury (born Farrokh Bulsara, 1946-1991) was the gay lead singer of rock band sensation, Queen. His death due to AIDs was a national sensation due to his fame, and was used to raise awareness of the virus, helping to diminish the epidemic.

Author: S_Werner, Permission: GFDL
3m high bronze statue of Freddie Mercury, looking over Lake Geneva, unveiled in 1996

He died of bronchopneumonia, brought on by AIDs, one day after publicly admitting that he had the disease in 1991.

From a very young age, Freddie proved himself to be a remarkably talented pianist and a singer with a formidable range (from bottom D to top B-flat, in case you were wondering). At the age of 23 Freddie joined Brian May and Roger Taylor to form the band called 'Queen'. In later interviews Freddie would say that "I was certainly aware of the gay connotations [of the band's name], but that was just one facet of it."

In the 1970s, Freddie had a long term relationship with Mary Austin which ended when Freddie had an affair with a male studio technician in the mid-70s. Austin remained a close friend, 'Love of my Life' is about and dedicated to her. From 1979 onwards, Freddie frequented gay bath-houses and had many short-term relationships with men. By 1985, Freddie was in a long term relationship with a hairdresser called Jim Hutton, who was tested HIV positive in 1990. Freddie was diagnosed with AIDs in 1987, but claimed he'd tested negative to the press.

Freddie's death was very important in the history of AIDs, in 1992 the Mercury Phoenix Trust was set up by the remaining band members, which organised the 'Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert for AIDs Awareness' in April 1992, and has since raised millions of pounds for the cause.

The LGBT History Series (21) - Monique Wittig

Monique Wittig (1935-2003) was a French radical lesbian, an author and a feminist theorist.

She was one of the founders of the Mouvement de Liberation des Femmes in 1970; the action of a group of women laying wreaths at the Arc de Triomphe was seen to be the founding event of French Feminism.

Wittig achieved her PhD in Social Sciences, and was a prolific speaker in French institutions and radical feminist and lesbian groups until in 1976, she taught in numerous US colleges, on courses such as 'Women's Studies' where her students were immersed in the correcting the American translation of the Lesbian Body.

Quotes from Wittig's books include: 'In literature, I do not separate women and men. One is a writer, or one is not. This is a mental space where sex is not determining...This is about building an idea of the neutral which could escape sexuality.'
'woman' has meaning only in heterosexual systems of thought and heterosexual economic systems. Lesbians are not women.'

Wittig was an advocate of universalism, claiming that the rise of the individual and the liberation of desire require the abolition of gender categories.

If any of this yanks your chain, the university library has 5 or 6 of her publications, but you'll have to wait until I've finished with them first :P.