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SQS SQS 1–2/2020: Sisällys / Innehåll / Contents 1–2/2020 Tuula Juvonen and Therese Quinn 3] Pervopeili: keskustelut / Queer Mirror: Discussions Looking Back, Looking Forward: Rita Paqvalén Queer History Month,Museums, Beyond Tom and Tove: Sisällys and Activism for Justice and Freedom I–IV Queering Finnish Museums from an Intersectional Innehåll Perspective 62–77 Contents 1] Pervoskooppi: artikkelit / Queer Scope: Articles Jaimi Parker and Morgan Gieringer Tuula Juvonen Exhibiting Regional LGBTQ History in Dallas, Queer as a Queer Guided Tour 1–21 Texas 78–94 Clinton Glenn Dan Vo Cultural Production and the Canonisation of The Compassionate Way: LGBT Histories in the Baltic States 22–44 Towards Trans and Non-Binary Inclusive Narratives in Museums 95–101 2] Pervoperuutuspeili: puheenvuorot / Leslie Wooden Queer View Mirror: Opinion Pieces Alvin Baltrop: Sue Sanders Queer Photography as a ‘Counter Practice’ Growing up Needing the Past: in the Archive 102–109 An Activist’s Reflection on the History of LGBT+ Cover image of the issue 1–2/2020 History Month in the UK 45–55 Jemina Lindholm and Kaura Raudaskoski of SQS – Journal of Queer Studies in Finland and the images on contents The Space Between The Lines Is Not Neutral: pages by cartoonist Roju, 2020. Tom Furber Pedagogical Labour in Failing Institutions 110–120 SQS-lehden numeron 1–2/2020 kansi- Straight from the Archives: kuvan ja sisällyssivujen kuvat on tehnyt ISSN sarjakuvataiteilija Roju, 2020. Reflections about Professional Engagement 1796-5551 with LGBTQ+ Lives 56–61 SQS SQS 1–2/2020: Sisällys / Innehåll / Contents 1–2/2020 4] Lectio praecursoria Riikka Taavetti Järkevin jalkinein henkilökohtaiseen ja Varpu Alasuutari yhteisölliseen queer-historiaan 146–148 On Death and Loss in Queer and Trans lives 121–126 Sisällys Innehåll Alexandra Novitskaya Contents 5] Pervosilmäys: arvostelut / Queer Eye: Reviews Failing Together in Solidarity 149–151 Rita Paqvalén Making Museums Relevant in a World of 6] Kirjoittajat / Contributors 152–155 Diversity 127–129 Nina Nyman How Activism on Gender and Sexuality is Changing Museums 130–133 Sarita Hernández Iridescent Futures: Imagining Alternatives with Queering the Museum 134–138 Rita Paqvalén Om museernas historiebruk och förändringsarbetets utmaningar 139–142 Asta Kihlman ISSN Kuvakorttien queer-fantasiaa 143–145 1796-5551 LOOKING BACK, LOOKING FORWARD SQS 1–2/2020 Queer History Month, Museums, and Activism for Justice and Freedom I Tuula Juvonen and Therese Quinn1 Introduction Tuula Juvonen and Therese Quinn1 Getting the Ball Rolling LGBT History Month was inaugurated that October (Farrow, 1995; Hemphill, 2015). LGBT History Month was initiated in the United States by an out schoolteacher named Rodney Wilson in 1994. Raised in a fundamentalist The wheel was invented again in 2004 in the United Kingdom by activist Christian family in the conservative midwestern state, Missouri, Wilson and teacher Sue Sanders and other members of Schools Out, a group began to study history as he “outgrew” his childhood religion (Wilson, working to challenge the oppression of LGBT people in the education 2015). His investigations took a personal turn as he started a coming out system, which Sanders co-founded in 1984 (Watters, 2012). Since then the process in his mid-twenties; Wilson explored LGBT history for “meaning, idea has travelled further, and now LHBT history is celebrated as Queer purpose and support” and found that what he learned gave him a “sense of History Month in Berlin, Germany, and as Rainbow History Month in place and potential” (Wilson, 2015). Wilson came out as gay to his high Finland, as just two examples. school students after they viewed a film about the Holocaust. This earned This special issue takes these annual celebrations as a starting point to him a reprimand from the school’s administration, telling him he could interrogate LGBTQI+ issues around museums and activism, a topic that only discuss “homosexuality in class if it was part of the existing history has during the past year experienced quite a boost. This is evidenced by curriculum” (Farrow, 1995). This became an opening for Wilson. He was the vibrant and well-attended Archives, Libraries, Museums and Special inspired by the successes of previous activists, who fought to see Black, Collections (ALMS) conferences, most recently held in Berlin in 2019 women’s, Latinx, Indigenous and other cultural histories acknowledged, on the theme Queering Memory2– and some of the papers included here to create LGBT History Month (Wilson, 2015; Farrow, 1995). He and are the direct outcomes of connections forged at ALMS. Also, several Tuula a friend began writing a proposal, and with the support of many others, Juvonen and Therese 2 Please note that many of the presentations are available at the Queering Mem- Quinn 1 This is a co-written paper with no first author. ory conference website https://queeralmsberlin2019.de/interactive-program/. recent interesting publications, included in this journal as reviews, attest establishing Rainbow History Month in 2018 and founding an association to a resurgent interest in linking culture and heritage sites to movements Friends of Queer History in 2020. This association now carries on and SQS for justice and social change, as of course does on-the-ground organizing expands the activities initiated by the History Month on their newly 1–2/2020 and actions by museum workers. launched website.3 A persistent need for our queer past, and a need to reflect upon the ways it Clinton Glenn, for his part, follows the “Firsts” in the Baltic region, II has been provided to us, is evidenced in this special issue. We have included namely the first queer art and history exhibitions that have taken place an essay by Sue Sanders, where she recollects not only on her personal there during the mid-2000s. He points out how these have taken up queer Introduction path to cocreating LGBTQ+ History Month in the United Kingdom, but politics and themes, and are shaped by resistance to the silencing effects also the inventive strategies the group of activists has successfully used to of communism, and both anti-LGBTQ conservatism and a rejection of push their agenda and to shift the attitudinal landscape in that country, “western” values. Moreover, the review written by Alexandra Novitskaya and beyond. She also describes the struggles forged by UK activists in the about Queer-Feminist Solidarity and the East-West Divide, and edited by Thatcher era, with its repressive take on anything but heteronormativity. Katharina Wiedlack, Saltanat Shoshanova and Masha Godovannaya, This vividly reminds us that the victories won are hard fought, and never provides additional background to the social and political situation that come with a guarantee. However, pushing through that difficult time has affects queers in the Post-Soviet regions. The anthology, this review notes, also taught the activists valuable lessons in organizing that allowed them offers a rich sampling of perspectives on solidarity efforts between queer to use LGBTQ+ History Month as a launchpad for related initiatives in and feminist communities in postsocialist Central and Eastern Europe schools, libraries, museums and other sites in the UK, from organizing and Eurasia, and in the West. lectures and programs, and developing a resource-rich website, to using social media to publicize events across the country. Doing the Walk It will likely surprise no one that how well LGBTQI+ history is presented and received is highly dependent on context and location – and the context Activists and cultural workers who aim at a more just society are also plays a role in how different initiatives had gotten off the ground. increasingly successful in pushing memory institutions to do their part of Unlike in the U.S., where LGBT History Month was introduced in the the work, too. Hence this volume includes texts written by practitioners schools, in the UK and in Finland the activism has expanded in particular in different memory institutions, who explicate their learning curve in in collaboration with museums and archives. Many times, social and their professional capacity when confronted with issues of queer pasts. institutional norms have compromised queer content in those venues. Morgan Gieringer and Jaimi Parker, who work at the University of North Tuula Rita Paqvalén relates a history of efforts to queer museums in Finland, with Texas Special Collections in Dallas, ended up creating several archival Juvonen exhibitions highlighting queer lives and cultures in a city thus far known and three exhibition projects in which she participated with other researchers, Therese artists and museum workers as focal points. These efforts have since led to Quinn 3 https://sateenkaarihistoria.fi/ more for its homophobia than being a supportive environment for queer in the midst of grief – but also create possibilities for adding to history. cultural production. The context was rather different for Tom Furber, who SQS works as an Engagement and Learning Officer in London Metropolitan It is also interesting to think who are the people who will be hailed 1–2/2020 Archives, which has collections dating to 1067, and queer records from when they are gone. Sometimes they are the very people who have been as early as 1395. Furber has well-established queer support groups that overlooked during their lifetime, as Leslie Wooden notes. In her essay she introduces us to the archive of a Black photographer from the United serve as “critical friends” – guiding and holding him accountable – as III he interprets artifacts related to LGBTQ+ history. These authors also States, Alvin Baltrop, who was dedicated to documenting his fellow queers, for example, in the piers of New York – much to dismay of his discuss the situation where they themselves are not members of the queer Introduction community they serve and reflect interestingly upon that experience and contemporaries. Yet, since his death in 2004, he has been rediscovered how they have mastered its challenges.