Archival Movements: South Africa's Gay and Lesbian Memory in Action

African Journal of Gender and Religion, 2022

Western Cape where her research focuses on the intersections of religion, gender and sexuality.

Inward Outward, Emotion in the Archive: A Publication of the 2021 Inward Outward Symposium, 2022

In this short chapter I focus on the themes of love and compassion and take a look at the archives of SUHO (Surinamese Homosexuals), a Dutch LGBTQIA+ group in the 1980s, and their reflections on James Baldwin. Through SUHO's accounts of Baldwin, I analyse how they reflected on racism, compassion and archival desires in the context of a transnational dialogue.

The practice of archiving and documentation carries an ongoing legacy as a means to objectify, dehumanize and criminalize the racialized and gendered minority subject for colonial purposes throughout the rise of imperialism. Yet, contemporary cultural theorists have been writing about the potential for ‘queer temporalities’ and ‘queer archiving’ to subvert such hegemonic institutional practices . This essay examines the qualities of alternative archiving methods through a case study of Mobile Homecoming, an inter-generational project aiming to collect underrepresented histories of queer black elders involved in community and social justice organizing in the United States. Drawing upon cultural theories on affect, sexuality and race, the essay explores the ways in which the archiving methods of Mobile Homecoming negotiate and subvert sites of meaning-making such as the ‘archive’, the ‘home’, and academic institutions. In particular, I attempt to understand the realm between the discursive and the corporeal, paying attention to contexts where intellectual analysis meets or complicates the material realities of queers of color and vice versa. For instance, how can archiving and storytelling as an affective process renegotiate or reaffirm the archive as a transformative force for social change? What contradictions and tensions come up within politically progressive or queer cultural theory? How do such practices transcend Euro-American understandings of truth, authenticity or political clout? By examining self-reflexive narrative and practices such as “queering the archive”, “family-making”, “emotionality” and political praxis, I suggest that such alternative archiving methods can act as strategies for cultural survival, healing and strengthening social justice movements.

2010

Abstract. This article explores the socio-political imperative and psychosocial value of reengaging and expanding the apartheid archive in contemporary South

In Plainspeak, 2018

QAMRA (Queer Archive for Memory Reflection and Activism) as the name suggests, is a gender and sexual minorities archive in India. It is a physical archive, located in the southern city of Bangalore. While preserving memories through collecting and collating multimedia material, the archive aims to be a living one, creating and furthering activism around gender and queer issues. The idea of this archive emerged from the audio/video material I have been collecting since 2001. This co-written article is based on a presentation titled QAMRA: Queer Archive and Visual Jurisprudence that the authors made at Arsenal, the 49th Berlinale Forum in 2018 on 22nd February 2018 in Berlin.

Radical History Review, 2014

Published in Carotenuto, Silvana & Jambrešić Kirin, Renata & Prlenda, Sandra (eds.) A Feminist Critique to Knowledge Production. L’Orientale University Press; Naples 2015, 175–185.