Past events 2017
Many of our recent educational forums, programs and events have been recorded on video and are available for viewing online. Scroll down for information on these programs and links to video recordings.
Recordings from 2017 were made possible by the generosity of Archive Productions, the official videographer for over 60 Bay Area nonprofits.
Author Talk | Among the Bohemians: Yone Noguchi & Charles Warren Stoddard
September 6, 2017
Speaker: Amy Sueyoshi
“Faces From the Past” is a new display in the “Queer Past Becomes Present” exhibition at the GLBT History Museum that portrays more than 150 years of queer presence in Northern California before 1930. In conjunction with the exhibit, historian Amy Sueyoshi traces the affairs of Japanese immigrant poet Yone Noguchi, San Francisco author Charles Warren Stoddard and their bohemian circle at the turn of the 20th century. Her talk examines how same-sex sexuality, marital infidelity and interracial love could exist openly in the United States in an era when the law criminalized sodomy and miscegenation. Sueyoshi is associate dean of the College of Ethnic Studies, San Francisco State University, and is the author of Queer Compulsions: Race, Nation and Sexuality in the Affairs of Yone Noguchi (2012).
Fighting Back | Gender Labels: Then & Now
August 22, 2017
Panelists: Alecs (aka Sailor), Alexsarah “Golden” Collier, Ola Osaze, Don Romesburg and Julia Serrano. Moderated by Gina White.
As part of our monthly “Fighting Back” series exploring contemporary queer-community issues in a historical context, “Gender Labels: Then and Now” offers a multigenerational conversation about the changing dynamics of gender labels within the LGBTQ community and among the general public. A panel of historians, authors and activists discuss the history of gender self-identification and gender-label assignment and will look at how this history can inform today’s evolving language for characterizing gender in the media, the workplace, social-justice movements and everyday conversation.
August 10, 2017
LGBTQ Portraits: A Queer Historical Perspective
Presented by Tirza Latimer, Pamela Peniston, Rudy Lemcke and Lenore Chin
Four noted art specialists discuss how LGBTQ artists and sitters have queered the conventions of the portrait. Why does portraiture — deeply implicated from its inception in the representation of kinship, affiliation and identity — remain important to queer communities in the so-called post-identity era? The panel features Tirza Latimer, chair of the Graduate Program in Visual and Critical Studies at the California College of the Arts; Pamela Peniston, director of the Queer Cultural Center; Rudy Lemcke, visual artist, and curator; and artist Lenore Chinn, whose painted and photographic queer portraits are currently on display in “Picturing Kinship: Portraits of Our Community by Lenore Chinn” at the GLBT Historical Society Museum.
July 28, 2017
Leather: Where We Came From, Where We’re Going
Panelists: Race Bannon, Rajat Dutta, Jordy Tackitt-Jones and Gayle Rubin. Moderated by Greg Pennington.
In conjunction with the new “South of Market: San Francisco’s Leather Scene” display in the “Queer Past Becomes Present” exhibition in our Main Gallery, curator Greg Pennington facilitates a discussion about the leather scene from the 1960s to the present and beyond.
July 25, 2017
Fighting Back: The Making of a Queer Museum
Moderated by Terry Beswick
As part of our GLBT Historical Society’s monthly “Fighting Back” series exploring contemporary queer issues in a historical context, “The Making of a Queer Museum” offers a multigenerational conversation about the role of museums in preserving and presenting the history and culture of marginalized communities. The panel includes cultural activists, independent scholars and museum professionals who describe their involvement in establishing population-specific public history institutions in San Francisco and elsewhere. The panelists’ remarks plus observations and comments from all who attend contributed to San Francisco’s Citywide LGBTQ Cultural Heritage Strategy.
July 14, 2017
Faces From the Past: Bay Area Queer Lives Before 1930
Presented by Paula Lichtenberg, Bill Lipsky, Will Roscoe and Clare Sears
“Faces From the Past” is a new display in the “Queer Past Becomes Present” exhibition in our Main Gallery. Using tintypes, postcards, arrest records and other historical documents, curators Paula Lichtenberg and Bill Lipsky examine over 150 years of queer presence before the 1930s in Northern California. The first of a series of programs in conjunction with the exhibit, this panel will feature the curators, along with two historians. Independent scholar Will Roscoe will discuss Queen Califia, the semi-mythical figure after whom California is named, and the two-spirits of the Bay Area, while San Francisco State University professor Clare Sears will speak on 19th-century San Francisco laws against cross-dressing and homosexual activity.
July 6, 2017
We Were Rebels: Jae Whitaker Remembers Janis Joplin
A conversation with Jae Whitaker, an African American lesbian musician who moved to San Francisco in the early 1960s to participate in the Beat scene that was centered in the city’s North Beach neighborhood. In 1963 she met the young Janis Joplin; the two became lovers and moved in together. Joey Cain, curator of our current exhibition “Lavender-Tinted Glasses: A Groovy Gay Look at the Summer of Love,” interviews Whitaker about her early life, the Beat scene, her relationship with Joplin, her experiences during the Summer of Love, and her life in San Francisco.
April 25, 2017
Fighting Back | Queers & Party Politics: A Community Conversation
Panelists: Kimberly Alvarenga, Harry Britt, Brad Chapin, Shaun Haines and Rebecca Prozan. Moderated by Don Romesburg.
As part of our monthly “Fighting Back” series exploring contemporary queer-community issues in a historical context, this multigenerational conversation features panelists addressing the history of LGBTQ involvement in party politics in San Francisco. How has the community’s participation in electoral politics served the LGBTQ movement in the past? How does it serve us now?
April 18, 2017
Preserving San Francisco’s LGBTQ Cultural Heritage
The City of San Francisco has launched a groundbreaking task force to develop a citywide strategy for preserving and promoting LGBTQ cultural heritage—not only historic sites and districts, but also legacy enterprises and cultural assets that make San Francisco an internationally recognized queer capital. The task force will identify priorities, propose legislation and recommend policy responses to honor local LGBTQ history and to safeguard the city’s historic queer culture. The LGBTQ cultural heritage strategy will be the first such citywide municipal initiative anywhere in the world. A community forum at the GLBT History Museum enables residents to provide feedback to the Cultural Heritage Strategy Task Force. Members facilitate a discussion on several questions: What does LGBTQ heritage mean to you? What neighborhoods, building, organizations, events or other cultural resources should be preserved, promoted or commemorated? What strategies should the City employ to carry out this work?
February 16, 2017
Living History: International Bear Rendezvous
From 1995 to 2011, the Bears of San Francisco (BOSF) produced International Bear Rendezvous (IBR), an annual gathering that celebrated older, larger, hairier, ruggedly masculine gay men. Guests arrived from throughout the U.S. and beyond for a Presidents Day weekend of fun, fundraising and friendship, culminating in the International Mr. Bear competition on Sunday evening. For this living history panel, organizers and participants come together for an evening of laughter, insight and remembering about this foundational event for the bear community.