This is the essay from information, systems and social change, in which I
reported on the activities during the lgbtq* history month last year.
February
February 2005 starts in January.
Stephen Bailey had curated an exhibition on love at the V&A and was speaking
at a session. Walking round the exhibition opened up the erotic and the
issue of whether it had any meaning at all. His presentation was
structurally heterosexist. The chair allowed no questions so he was tackled
afterwards, and just wallowed in it. This led to a letter to the V&A so we
will see what will emerge?
On the last Friday, the V&A opens late and the dedication to January was
beauty, following the exhibition. That gave us the chance to walk round the
museum with gay history in our mind to see what we could see. This we might
turn into a photo essay on the last Friday of February.
The following Monday we were back at the V&A again, for a talk on
Burlingtonıs Chiswick House model which is in the British Galleries. There
was no mention so I raised it afterwards. An extra ordinary lack of
interest. But a reference to a curator who might be interested.
Then first Wednesday. First Wednesday is when the National Gallery is open
late, with music, and on this occasion, strawberries dipped in chocolate and
champagne. A chance to look around with gay eyes and see what I can see.
This lead to a letter to the Director, which had a card and then a letter
indicating nothing understood. There will be a Carrrivaggio exhibition
opening on 23rd February so to that we will return. That started me on the
Cupid Case. This needs a lot more work.
A quick scamper to the London School of Economics for the Luckman of Berger
and, with a chance to intervene which has led to a letter to the chair, so
perhaps more will follow?
First Thursday was the turn of the British Museum. The Enlightenment
Gallery we have done already, we have done already the Thera Case, written
to Hilary Williams and had a reply. The next chance will be an extra
ordinary meeting later in the month.
Late Friday the Tate Britain is open, so a chance then to work around there.
That led to a longer note.
But earlier that day I had been speaking at the NATFHE Equality Advisory
Council and written a note for the lgbthistory month, with no response at
all. I canıt see how the site is a record of the events of the month?
The following Monday I was speaking at the Institute of Historic Research
with the London Socialist History Group on taking a kissybion for a walk. I
have written this up as satyrs in suburbia, which will be published in
information and social change
Then I attended a session of the Garden History Society where Kim Wilkie was
talking on Arcadia. The chair wouldnıt allow any questions, so I have
written to the chair making the point I was not permitted to make, and we
will see what happens.
Next on the list, a Tuesday night, is Jenny Uglow speaking at the British
Library on writers and the garden as part of the exhibition. Iım afraid I
fall asleep for I am not sure how much, so I canıt in all honesty tell what
she said. During questions I appeal for the republishing of some of the
texts such as Walpole and Maspn by the British Library with illustrations.
Afterwards I ask her for the evidence behind her comment in the Royal
Academy article on Burlington but she doesnıt have any. Simply the letters
between Kent and him. I wonder where those are?
Then we have a meeting of the Higher Education Funding Council for England
on their action plan for sustainable development in education consultation.
This gives me the chance to make the point about libraries and their
organisation, controlled vocabularies, using the example of Dewey and
homosexuality. I have to write the comment still and will use that as an
illustration.
The middle of February sees a lecture by Michael Snodin of the V&A at the
Royal Geographic Society on behalf of the World Monuments Fund on Thames
Arcadia. He mentions all the names at the heart of my Suburban Arcadia, but
never once the gay word. This will provoke a letter so we will see what
happens? It does convince me I have most of the right people lined up. Not
an heterosexual among them.
From Snodin I find out that Yale is intending to track all the five thousand
things which were at Strawberry Hill. This sounds to me like progress on
metadata and might help me on Hardianıs bottom. He suggests that in 2009/10
there will be a big exhibition on Walpole.
Should I consider a Walpole case?
Thursday 17th was the extraordinary general meeting of the British Museum
and a chance to return to a matter raised at the Annual General Meeting,
before the beginning of the month. There has been correspondence, and
discussion and we will simply have to leave this to another matter, it is
much too big for one month. But the event was the opportunity for another
excursion into Enlightenment and Burlington cases.
That Saturday the annual general meeting of the Ramblersı Association for
Surrey, nothing obviously gay at all, I make my annual point about motorism
and the need for public transport and walking integration, no change there,
but the surprise is the guest speaker, who is talking about volunteering as
a category. Apparently this is the year of the volunteer and Gordon Brown
is very keen on it all.
Given that we are all volunteers when it comes to sexuality, oh no we
arenıt, oh yes we are, behind you, this seems a category which might be
worth exploring to fit into the diversity, sustainable development,
governance thread and prove a way of moving all this forward?
The National Gallery has an exhibition opening on Caravaggio. It is packed
and sold out. The catalogue gives away nothing. But there is no evidence of
anything which one would identify as homosexual.
25th is Last Friday at the V&A. This was intended to have been on the theme
of agitate, educate, organise but they cancelled it. I wonder whether the
management may be done for bringing the museum into disrepute? I asked
several staff the reason and had several answers. Perhaps it was my boots
only flash mobbing?
This was the last of the gallery events which had been promoted through the
Fort and the lgbthm, and I must be quite clear, I havenıt seen a
recognisable soul, sole, during the whole month. In that sense as an
exercise in community building it has been a complete failure, as an
exercise in the relation between the organisational form and the engineering
of social change, it has rather made my case on the need for organisation.
February was slightly extended into March, for the first of March was the
first Wednesday at the National Gallery. Again the Caravaggio was
completely booked and sold out, again there was no recognition anywhere of
anything gay.
In parallel with these meetings, I have been spending a little time looking
at the British Library integrated catalogue and some of the resources now
electronically available there; what is becoming a major resource. The word
has 2,000 hits. The Library has an exhibition of Wilde, and a display in the
bookshop. This is the only event we have seen this month and it makes no
reference to the month.
Notes on what I have been looking at I can scribble down but putting them
into any sort of order will be more difficult.
The most amazing discovery was completely by accident. The Encyclopedia
Irania is divided into a large number of sections and the first word and
last work of the entries of a section appear in the title field of the
catalogue. Two sections divided homosexuality so two sections appeared in
the catalogue, otherwise I would never have known even that it existed.
Reading the sections gives the sort of theological historic account I would
expect but then there is a section on poetry of what is called ghazal and it
sounds exactly like theocritian idylls or epigrams. A search on Index to
These and Dissertations Abstracts shows that Ghazal is a fairly common name,
but that there has been work on these, so perhaps we can follow that lead?
The point is made that this poetry and those laws and religions run parallel
in the same society at the same time so that might be a valuable parallel
for other societies?
The next discovery is the subject catalogue in printed form in the Rare
Books collection, where it turns out the volumes for 1961 - 70, printed in
1982, do not have the word homosexuality, unless there is something about
the organisation I donıt understand. This is ten years after the Gay
Librariansı Group has been formed. And the volumes for 1971 - 1975, printed
in 1986, donıt have it either. This beggars belief but also raise the issue
of what the term is actually recording, the 2,000 entries, in what I am
looking at. This is meat for a question to the readersı adviser.
Next what I found valuable were some bibliographies published by Scarecrow,
substantial coverage until the 1980s. One substantial piece of work is on
lesbianism. I wonder how she distinguished lesbian literature from straight
men turning themselves on? At least gay literature doesnıt have to deal with
this, unless Iris Murdoch is doing it in reverse? She I must find out more
about?
In one of them an essay by Richtor Norton Ganymede raped, on censorship,
written in 1982. I wish I had known of his work in the days of Librarians
for Social Change.
In parallel I found the bibliography of the Royal Historical Society on the
web through the BL.. I donıt know yet the basis of how it is available but
records point to copac which I think is a really good idea. A total of 196
records, more than I found at the Institute of Historic Research, but
gardens more than two thousand, landscape more than four thousand landscape
gardens more than four hundred so some under representation perhaps?
LISA showed me how weak the professional coverage has been, some stuff from
north America, but a total of 77 articles, most under five pages. This
provoked the LISA case. I think that should be kept up for finding resources
electronically.
I also find out that what I thought was going to be simple will in fact be
very difficult. The idea was that if we could find out when books were
published how many were printed and who the subscribers were we could begin
to set up associations. It turns out, which completely surprises me, that
this will be very hard work, no one has tried to do it, and we are starting
from the beginning. I wonder why that is?
At this stage I am still only on record 400 of the two thousand so Iım not
sure this will be finished this month. The way the catalogue is organised
drives me up the wall.
Have found a couple of works on dealing with homosexuality in schools, which
given the queering the curriculum, it seems to me should be in libraries.
They are all north American. Lipkin, A. Understanding homosexuality in
schools, Westview Press, 1999, given a quick skim, seems good. This wasnıt
what I started out looking for, perhaps I should?
In parallel again, looking at Marwickıs Nature of History, page 45,6, and he
falls at my feet. I must write to him. Then I find in Richtorıs essay on
Ganymede raped a lovely comment (from 1982 remember, distinguishing the
opposite sex from the other, with the line ³dehumanising mathematical
proposition² which I might use.
The Courthauld and Warburg Institute Journal is beginning to look like rich
pickings. I must find an open shelf access set. It is available on JSTOR,
which Kingston doesnıt have, and printing at the BL will be more expensive
than inter library loans.
In parallel with all this stuff I should add that when the homo word isnıt
used, how do you expect to find anything, so I have been scanning the
shelves at Kingston University, just skimming Eighteenth Century History
and the Gothic I found near one another in the history section and
immediately picked up a couple of likely suspects. Donıt know how this will
develop or where it will go. Blogging might be the answer?
One text I have on interlibrary loan has opened a category of text I havenıt
though about, the letter. He starts with a nice point, that epistles come
before gospels and plays on this. he then goes into the letters of James
VI&I and his familiars, a term we might find useful. Will those of
Burlington and Kent provide material? This along with Marwick might be the
reads of February?
Except that a fortnight into March arrives the inter library loan of Vern
Bulloughıs two volume bibliopgraphy, compiled between 1954 and 1976. What a
gem this is. It will take months of work to go through it, I simply donıt
have the time. The Wellcome Library is the source that might have to be
opened up, I have never even been there. The organisation of the
bibliography, the categories and structures, is going to make a difference
too. I wonder how this has escaped me until now? It has also an account
of the early work to get the Library of Congress subject headings sorted
into something like the form they are now, none of which I knew anything
about.
I ought to try to draw together what I have learned during the month, but
this is only the account, the diary, the record, the witting testimony. The
rest I will leave to elsewhere.
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