Gay Liberation

In this podcast Professor Sally R Munt of the University of Sussex discusses the origins and development of the British LGBTQ+ Civil Rights Movement.

1. Context - Advocates for social change and liberalisation. Different minorities become mobilised.
2. Partial de-criminalisation of homosexuality in 1967. The emergence of discrete gay communities.
3. A focus on personal liberation, a revolution for the right to be oneself. The Gay Liberation Front forms.
4. The influence of the Women's Liberation Movement.
5. Common cause was made between struggles against homophobia, racism, sexism and classism.
6. Fighting negative sterotypes and combating internalised negative sterotypes. Building a common purpose.
7. External oppression and internal homophobia.
8. The emergence of a political community.
9. The legacy of the GLF and Gay Culture. Visibility and the power of 'Coming Out'.

 

Suggested Reading:

Bob Cant Footsteps and Witnesses: Lesbian and Gay Lifestories from Scotland (1993)

Bob  Cant Radical Records: Thirty Years of Lesbian and Gay History, 1957-1987 (1988)

Steve Whittle A Transgender Studies Reader (Taylor & Francis: Routledge, 2006)

Alison Oram The Lesbian History Source Book: Love and Sex Between Women in Britain 1780-1970 (Routledge, 2001) [with Annmarie Turnbull]

Sally R Munt and Andy Medhurst Lesbian and Gay Studies: A Critical Introduction (Cassell, 1997)

Richard Dyer Now You See It: Studies on Lesbian and Gay Film, 2nd edn. (Routledge, 2002)

Richard Dyer The Culture of Queers (Routledge, 2001)