New Directions in Queer Oral History

This comprehensive international collection reflects on the practice, purpose, and functionality of queer oral history, and in doing so demonstrates the vibrancy and innovation of this rapidly evolving field.Drawing on the roots of oral history’s original commitment to "history from below" queer oral history has become an indispensable methodology at the heart of queer studies. Expanding and extending the existing canon, this book offers up key observations about queer oral history as a methodology, and how it might be advanced through cutting edge approaches. The collection contains a mix of contributions from established scholars, early career researchers, postgraduate students, archivists, and activists, ensuring its accessibility and wide appeal.The go-to reference for queer oral history for scholars, undergraduate and postgraduate students, and community-engaged practitioners, New Directions in Queer Oral History advances rigorous methodological and theoretical debates and constitutes a significant intervention in the world of oral history.

"This is a terrific collection: an outstanding volume of unusual breadth and depth, in a rapidly expanding field of inquiry. With a compelling foreword by Nan Alamilla Boyd, contextualising introduction by three co-editors, and nineteen chapters drawn from diverse oral history projects with innovative methodologies, the book ranges geographically from the country to the city, across Australia, Canada, UK, and US. It engages an astounding array of narrators, from LGBTQ+ children of Holocaust survivors to straight and gay nurses navigating the early AIDS crisis, from intersex and marriage equality activists to trans military veterans. In addition to complex accounts of shame, job loss, reticence, and dissemblance, they tell unforgettable stories of lives lived loud, proud, and against the grain.As gender and sexuality studies grows ever stronger and richer, these authors’ insights will guide students, inform colleagues, and empower community members for years to come. New Directions in Queer Oral History is an enormously important contribution to scholarship – and to queer cultures around the world."John Howard, King’s College London, UK"New Directions in Queer Oral History: Archives of Disruption reminds us why queer oral history is at the cutting edge of oral history practice and theory. Bringing together a diverse range of contributors working on lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, and queer histories in a variety of national contexts, this rich collection provokes us to think again about our practice of oral history and both the limits and radical potential of the stories we generate. Raising difficult questions such as whether it is necessary, or indeed enough, for interviewers to share an LGBTQ+ identity with narrators; how intergenerational dynamics shape both the interview and our wider sense of community and self; and how we respond to the ethical dilemmas of probing traumatic histories, this lively and intimate collection shows how far queer oral history has come and points to the productive and disruptive possibilities of this fascinating field."Rebecca Jennings, UCL, UK

Clare Summerskill gained her doctorate from Royal Holloway, University of London, UK. Her research interests include the ethics of verbatim theatre processes and the role of the contributor in such productions. She works as a visiting lecturer at various UK universities and she is also a playwright, oral historian, and stand-up comedian.Amy Tooth Murphy is a lecturer in oral history at Royal Holloway, University of London, UK. Her research interests include British post-war lesbian history; oral history theory and method; butch/femme cultures and identities; and lesbian literature. Her current research project is an exploration of butch lived experience and identity from 1950 to present.Emma Vickers is a senior lecturer at Liverpool John Moores University in the UK. She specialises in queer British history and is the author of Queen and Country: Same-sex Desire in the British Armed Forces, 1939–1945 (2013). She is interested in the intersection between psychotherapy and oral testimony.