Join us for this year’s OUTing the Past event as we host the conference online to a live audience.

The Zoom link for this online event will be sent to attendees before the event

Hosted by Leeds City Museum, OUTing the Past is an international celebration of LGBT+ history and includes an excellent programme of speakers covering a wide range of LGBT+ topics.

The event is free to join via Zoom, but places are limited .

OUTing the Past: Leeds Event Programme – A webinar hosted by Leeds City Museum

Saturday 12 February 2022

09:50-10:00 Welcome and Introduction to Outing The Past – Leeds

10:00-10:30 Alex Holmes (She)

The Secret Lives of Scientists. LGBTQ+ representation and inclusion in the sciences has historically been erased or kept separate from the work and knowledge. This continues now with calls to keep science away from politics and topical conversation, but identity- either those doing the science or those having science done unto them – is key in the scientific process, interpretation of results and how they are fed into the wider community.

Interlude

10:40-11:10 Luna Morgana (She)

The Gallus of Catterick. The Gallus of Catterick was an ancient roman trans woman whose remains were discovered in 1982. Join us for a journey through how she would have lived in 4th Century AD Britain.

Interlude

11:20-11:50 Tilen Kolar (he)

Queer Memorials: disrupted space-time. Queer memorials bring past, present and future together -they disturb the heteronormative public space. This presentation will reveal some of the research findings from the fieldwork in Amsterdam – how activists and everyday users experience the Homomonument and how they interact with it. Moreover, I will share my personal experience and feelings associated with my fieldwork.

12:00-12:30 Henry Kyem (he)

Growing up gay in Ghana. A personal story about growing up gay in an African country (Ghana). Having to come to terms with contracting HIV later in life and fleeing to the UK to avoid persecution from family and society for my sexuality.

12:40-13:00 LUNCH

13:00-13:30 Deirdre Swain (she)

Murder and forbidden love: the life and work of Patricia Highsmith. Last year marked the hundredth anniversary of the birth of Patricia Highsmith, a fascinating writer who changed my life. She is the author of The Talented Mr. Ripley and is best known as a mystery and crime novelist. However, her second novel, The Price of Salt belonged to a different literary genre. It was groundbreaking and unique at the time of its publication in 1952. It is considered to be the first lesbian novel where neither female protagonists find themselves in a tragic situation at the end of the book. It was written under a pseudonym, because Highsmith did not want to be known as a lesbian author. My presentation discusses the novel, The Price of Salt, the inspiration surrounding it, and the life of Patricia Highsmith, the details of which are compelling and, at times, disturbing.

Interlude

13:40-14:00 Aleks Fagelman (they)

Presentations of gender in the ancient world: A discussion of the Dresden Satyr and the Hermaphrodite statue. I shall discuss the Dresden Satyr and Hermaphrodite statue, as well as comparing it with other examples of hermaphroditic statues in the ancient world. I shall use this to highlight how the history of intersex and transgender identity is something that is not a modern invention but exists for several thousand years.

Interlude

14:10-14:40 Freya Stancliffe (she)

In search of the invisible. I am working on an internship working in the internal archives of the University of Leeds with the goal of increasing the visibility and accessibility of LGBTQ+ voices. This involves looking through reports, correspondence, meeting minute notes, society materials etc. Sadly, LGBTQ+ people feature more through being talked about, rather than having their own narrative voice. The next phase of my work will be outreach and community engagement, attempting to fill some of the gaps that we found in the archives.

14:45-14:55 Final comments and end of the event