Queer San Francisco

San Francisco — The GLBT Historical Society has announced a free program series starting September 11 that will spotlight how processes of urban renovation that once helped create spaces for queer community and culture now threaten to erase their presence. “The G Spot: Gentrification, Transformation and Queer San Francisco” will bring together historians, activists, residents and visitors to discuss the ways in which history can inform thinking about the place of GLBT people in urban settings today. From September 2014 through March 2015, the society will offer monthly community seminars focusing on specific themes in tandem with activities such as films, artist talks, author readings, walking tours and bar crawls.

“San Francisco has long done things queerly, but the current earthquake of gentrification may change all that,” said series cocurator Nan Alamilla Boyd, a professor at San Francisco State University. “GLBTQ communities have often been linked to gentrification in oversimplified ways. This series explores the more complicated reality of queer San Francisco’s world-making, including its complicity in and resistance to troubling forces of economic development.”

The seminars will take place at the GLBT History Museum at 4127 18th St. in San Francisco, a centrally located space in the heart of the Castro District. The museum interprets queer history through the display of objects and information, attracting approximately 15,000 visitors annually from around the world and contributing to the identity of the Castro as a tourist destination.

“‘The G Spot’ queers the conversation about gentrification by inviting everyone into an engaging dialogue about GLBT history, memory and the challenges of urban transformation,” said series cocurator Don Romesburg, a professor at Sonoma State University. “Our community seminars and cultural events provide an exciting opportunity to discuss the ways that sexuality and gender shape urban development, racial belonging and displacement, and possibilities for social justice.”

The first seminar in the series is set for Thursday, September 11, from 7 to 9 p.m. Boyd and Romesburg will join cocurator Raquel Gutiérrez, a writer, performer and cultural organizer, for a community discussion titled “Homelands and Safe Space.” The conversation will explore what it means to claim GLBT homelands and will raise several questions: What kinds of spaces of belonging and safety have existed historically for diverse queer populations? How have those spaces been contested and policed? How have they changed over time?

To foster a robust dialogue that goes beyond the “panelists talking to an audience” format, the curators will make brief and accessible readings available one month prior to each seminar to everyone who has registered. Community participants are encouraged to sign up for the series of seminars before the September kickoff, but anyone can drop in or out at any time. With support from a generous sponsorship by San Francisco State University, the programs and events in the series will be free and open to all.

For the complete schedule of the monthly events, visit tinyurl.com/gspotseminar. To register online and to view the list of suggested readings, visit g-spot-series.eventbrite.com.

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EDITOR’S NOTE: See below for the full program for “The G Spot: Gentrification, Transformation and Queer San Francisco,” background on the GLBT History Museum and biographies of the series curators. You may reproduce these images in association with coverage of the series: http://bit.ly/1BZ9Xkh and http://bit.ly/1uvBlm9 (the latter with credit to photographer Daniel Nicoletta).

FULL SERIES SCHEDULE

Exploring what it means to claim GLBT homelands. How does this occupation relate to the pursuit of “safe space”? What kinds of spaces of belonging and safety have existed historically for diverse queer people? How have they been contested and policed? How have they changed over time?

Thursday, September 11

7 – 9 p.m.

IN CONVERSATION: Nan Alamilla Boyd, Raquel Gutiérrez and Don Romesburg.

Friday, September 26

7 – 9 p.m.

ARTS PROGRAM: “Going Down on Valencia.” A reading by Michelle Tea with comment by Darius Bost, assistant professor, San Francisco State University, and Vero Majano, filmmaker.

The larger forces of urban redevelopment have transformed the waterfront and numerous San Francisco neighborhoods. Many are familiar with the profound effects these forces have had on communities of color and working-class people. What is the relationship between redevelopment and gentrification? How are racial and socioeconomic aspects of redevelopment connected to the gentrification of queer neighborhoods and the displacement of diverse queer populations in the Bay Area? How have these dynamics been navigated and challenged?

Thursday, October 2

7 – 9 p.m.

IN CONVERSATION: Marcia Ochoa, University of California, Santa Cruz; Mia Tu Mutch, LYRIC; and Robbie Clark, Causa Justa.

Thursday, October 16

7 – 9 p.m.

ARTS PROGRAM: Film Showing: Take This Hammer (45 mins.) and Viva 16 (30 mins.).

GLBT tourists have been drawn to San Francisco for many decades–and many have set down roots. Nonqueer tourists have also been attracted by the city’s reputation as a “wide-open town.” In the past few decades, however, gay merchant groups and the City of San Francisco have mounted strategic efforts to enhance visitorship through GLBT-related initiatives. How has GLBT-related tourism shaped neighborhood development and gentrification? What are the implications of evolving neighborhood-based tourist interests?

Thursday, November 13

7 – 9 p.m.

IN CONVERSATION: Jon Ballesteros, senior vice president of public policy, San Francisco Travel Association, and Brian Basinger, director, AIDS Housing Alliance.

Thursday, November 20 7 – 9 p.m.

ARTS PROGRAM: Raquel Gutiérrez and Eric Stanley in dialogue with Constance Hockaday.

Since the 1960s, organized GLBT involvement in government and electoral politics has shaped the landscape of San Francisco. How has this engagement related to urban renewal, development and gentrification? What have been some of the positions held by various GLBT politicians and activists, and what kinds of possibilities for living in the city have resulted from GLBT political activism and involvement?

Thursday, December 4

7 – 9 p.m.

IN CONVERSATION: Gabriel Haaland, labor organizer with SEIU Local 1021, and Andrea Shorter, member, San Francisco Commission on the Status of Women.

Occupation of urban space is never done on neutral ground. In the Bay Area, local struggles to claim, defend and produce different kinds of sites for GLBT possibility have long been central to the urban landscape. What are the effects of such challenges around territory? Are there some ways to sort through them that are more just than others?

Thursday, January 8

7 – 9 p.m.

IN CONVERSATION: Anna Conda, Harvey Milk Democratic Club, and Maria Poblet, Causa Justa.

Saturday, January 24

3 – 5 p.m.

ARTS PROGRAM: “Valencia Street Was Queer: An Interactive Walking Tour,” with Michelle Tea, Vero Majano and others.

Since the kids of Vanguard, a radical gay youth group, called for “street power” in the 1960s, some LGBT activists and artists have demanded accountability for the violence and displacements of San Francisco’s processes of gentrification and marginalization. What lessons from the past can inform the struggles of today?

Thursday, February 5

7 – 9 p.m.

IN CONVERSATION: Tommi Avicolli Mecca, San Francisco Housing Rights Committee, and Christina Hanhardt, associate professor, University of Maryland.

Saturday, February 28

4 – 10 p.m.

ARTS PROGRAM: Pop-Up Gay Bar: Ghosts of Gentrification Crawl.

The GLBT Historical Society is a vital institution for preserving and interpreting diverse queer lives in a Bay Area that experiences endless processes of dramatic urban renewal and change. Its GLBT History Museum is centrally located at the heart of the Castro’s commercial district. The museum stages historical interpretation with an eye toward social justice, attracting approximately 15,000 visitors from around the world annually. It also functions as an aspect of the Castro’s ongoing gentrification. How are archives and museums both crucial to survival and an aspect of urban development? Moving forward, what roles should public or nonprofit institutions play in questions of queer belonging, historical memory and urban transformation?

Thursday, March 12

7 – 9 p.m.

IN CONVERSATION: Nan Alamilla Boyd, Raquel Gutiérrez and Don Romesburg.

The Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society collects, preserves and interprets the history of GLBT people and the communities that support them. Founded in 1985, the society is recognized internationally as a leader in the field of GLBT public history. Its GLBT History Museum in San Francisco’s Castro District is the only full-scale, stand-alone museum of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender history and culture in the United States. The society’s professionally staffed archives preserve one of the world’s largest collections of GLBT historical materials. For more information, visit www.glbthistory.org.

Nan Alamilla Boyd earned a B.A. in history at the University of California, Berkeley and an M.A. and a Ph.D. in American civilization at Brown University. She is professor of women and gender studies at San Francisco State University, where she teaches courses in the history of sexuality, queer theory, historical methodology and urban studies. She has published reviews and articles in the Journal of American History, Feminist Teacher, the Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, the Journal of the History of Sexuality, Radical History Review, English Language Notes, Signs, Frontiers, Gender & Society, and the Radical Philosophy Review. Her book Wide Open Town: A History of Queer San Francisco to 1965 (University of California Press, 2003) charts the rise of gay and lesbian politics in San Francisco and draws from the 45 oral histories she conducted as part of her research. Her second book, Bodies of Evidence: the Practice of Queer Oral History (Oxford, 2012), edited with Horacio N. Roque Ramírez, pairs 14 oral history excerpts with commentaries by oral historians. Boyd also has been a long-time volunteer at the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco. She founded the Historical Society’s oral history project in 1992, served as cochair of the Archives Committee from 2004 to 2008, and served two terms on the Board of Directors. She is currently at work on a third book project, a history of tourism in San Francisco that explores the commodification of racialized and sexualized neighborhoods.

Don Romesburg is associate professor and chair in Sonoma State University Women’s and Gender Studies Department, where he founded the university’s queer studies minor. Trained as a historian with interdisciplinary gender and sexuality studies emphases, he earned his M.A. from the University of Colorado and his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley. His scholarship appears in the Journal of the History of Sexuality, Radical History Review, Studies in Gender and Sexuality and Historical Sociology and in anthologies such as the Routledge History of Childhood in the Western World and Transgender Studies Reader 2. Romesburg writes on the history of adolescence and sexuality, queer families, public queer history, and the social and cultural history of queer and trans performers. He also cochairs the Committee on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender History, an affiliated society of the American Historical Association. He cofounded the GLBT History Museum in San Francisco, where he serves as one of the curators. In addition, Romesburg is one of the lead editors of “Making the Framework FAIR: California History-Social Science Framework Proposed LGBT Revisions Related to the FAIR Education Act” (2014), which calls upon California’s Department of Education to make comprehensive revisions across its framework in compliance with a law that mandates inclusion of LGBT people and people with disabilities in K-12 history and social science education.

Raquel Gutiérrez is a writer, live performer, film actor, curator, playwright and cultural organizer. She writes on art, culture, music, film, performance and community-building and creates original solo and ensemble performance compositions. Gutiérrez earned her M.A. in performance studies from New York University in 2004. She is an expert in creating artist-community partnerships for a range of institutional and community-based organizations. She is a founding member of the performance ensemble Butchlalis de Panochtitlan (BdP), a community-based and activist-minded group aimed at creating a visual vernacular around queer Latinidad in Los Angeles. Gutiérrez also cofounded Tongues, a project of VIVA and Epicentro Poetry project. She has published work most recently in The Portland Review and Ambientes: New Queer Latino Writing. Currently, she is working on a novel, as well as essays about her favorite performance and visual artists and the state of art and community-building.