Guide to the Queer Nation Records, 1990-1996 (bulk dates 1990-1991)

Processed by Daniel Spencer; machine-readable finding aid created by Gabriela A. Montoya; container list updated by Devin McGeehan Muchmore

Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society

989 Market Street, Lower Level

San Francisco, California 94103

Phone: (415) 777-5455

Email: reference@glbthistory.org

URL: http://www.glbthistory.org/

Guide to the Queer Nation Records, 1990-1996 (bulk dates 1990-1991)

Accession number: 1993-02

Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society

San Francisco, California

Contact Information:

Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society
989 Market Street, Lower Level
San Francisco, California 94103
Phone: (415) 777-5455
Email: reference@glbthistory.org
URL: http://www.glbthistory.org/

Processed by:: Daniel Spencer
Date Completed:: October 1996
Encoded by:: Gabriela A. Montoya

Descriptive Summary

Title:

Queer Nation

Records,

Date (inclusive): 1990-1996 (bulk dates 1990-1991)

Accession number: 1993-02

Creator:

Queer Nation

Extent: 0.8 linear feet

Repository: The Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society.

San Francisco, California.

Language: English.

Administrative Information

Acquisition

The bulk of the records were received in 1993 (#1993-02).

Access

Collection is open for research.

Publication Rights

Copyright to unpublished manuscript materials has been transferred to the Gay and Lesbian Historical Society of Northern California.

Audio-Visual Materials

There is one videotape in the collection.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item],

Queer Nation

Records, 1993-02, The Gay and Lesbian Historical Society of Northern California.

Historical Note

Queer Nation

San Francisco was a direct action group with the purpose of advancing queer rights. Founded in July of 1990, one month after New York City's

Queer Nation

, it deployed tactics similar to those of the AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power (ACT-UP), namely street protests, postering, and other "unapologetic," "in your face" political demonstration. Like ACT-UP, it lacked clear boundaries of membership and had no official leadership structure. Weekly meetings, held at the Mission District's Women's Building, were open to all, and decisions were made by consensus. Meetings included reports and proposals from focus groups, which met during or outside the general meeting to concentrate on their affinity, such as police violence or activist art.

However, unlike ACT-UP,

Queer Nation

was not oriented toward ending the AIDS crisis. Rather its general objective was to reverse the precieved trend of increasing homophobia which had followed the AIDS pandemic. Also,

Queer Nation

organized under the polymorphous identity of "queer" which was intended to be more inclusive of diversity and less exclusive of cultural (as opposed to legal) action than other, more "assimilationist" gay or lesbian groups.

Among the more prominent focus groups of

Queer Nation

SF were LABIA (Lesbians And Bi-women In Action), United Colors of

Queer Nation

, UBIQUITOUS (Uppity Bi Queers United In Their Overtly Unconventional Sexuality), Queer Planet, and DORIS SQUASH (Defending Our Rights In the Streets, Super Queers United Against Savage Heterosexism). Much internal communication was accomplished through Queerline, a voice mail service, and Queer Week, a photocopied newsletter.

No records exist of the group's dissolution, although there is documentation of internal disputes among active members in the summer of 1991 which followed a controversial political action outside the home of then San Francisco Board of Supervisors member Roberta Achtenberg.

Scope and Content

The

Queer Nation

San Francisco records (1 linear foot) document the weekly meetings, regular political and cultural actions, and press coverage of this short-lived but prominent coalition of the early 1990s. The records range from the group's inception in 1990 until 1991 (with the addition of an open letter published in 1996 intended to clarify the group's founding). The records are divided into five series: chronological, visuals, focus groups, communications, and non-

Queer Nation

San Francisco.

The

Title: chronological series

is comprised primarily of files documenting each weekly general meeting. Interspersed are files documenting actions and workshops sponsored by the group between meetings. Some consecutive general meeting records are combined. Folders contain agendas, notes from meetings, newsletters, proposals for action, notices of up-coming events, and press clippings in this order. Some files contain records of topical discussions beyond the usual business, for instance, a forum on race and racism in the queer community (December 5, 1990), an effective media outreach workshop (February 2, 1990), a forum on sexism and women's issues (March 9, 1991), a discussion of an action at Mayor Agnos' house (March 27, 1991), and a forum on HIV presented by 4H: Happy, Healthy, Hip Homosexuals (April 3, 1991).

The

Title: chronological series

were organized by a

Queer Nation

archivist and are incomplete. The contents of each chronological file have been maintained, although items have been re-arranged to form a consistent order. Stickers distributed at meetings have been removed for preservation purposes to a folder in the visuals series. Non-

Queer Nation

SF fliers distributed at meetings have been compiled in a folder in the final series. Records which were not originally included in the chronological files have been organized by subject in later series. Within these subjects, items have been arranged in chronological order when possible.

The

Title: visuals series

contains examples of

Queer Nation's

distinctive graphic style, which was primarily circulated through small, brightly colored stickers. The photographic holdings contain news photographs from

Queer Nation

-sponsored shopping trips to suburban malls. The photographs are in several forms: black and white prints, contact sheets, and negatives.

The

Title: focus groups series

is comprised of files documenting the activities of several prominent committees within

Queer Nation

, which often functioned independently of the larger group or which undertook to inform the larger group of their area of interest. Included are: printed materials intended to educate Queer Nationalists about racism, essays collected for a forum on bisexuality, and fliers and postcards for a campaign against Amnesty International's exclusion of queer human rights issues.

The

Title: communications series

contains materials documenting both internal and external communication of the group. The Queerline scripts document the regularly up-dated messages broadcast to callers of this

Queer Nation

phone information service. Included in each script are calendars of upcoming actions, schedules of upcoming focus group meetings, and emergency activations. The Queer Week newsletters are filed with a fact sheet from its publisher, the Media Committee of

Queer Nation

San Francisco, describing its distribution, circulation, contributors, content, purpose, and production. Included are Volume I, numbers 1-14, and Volume II, number 1. Queer and Out, also published by the Media Committee, is a compilation of coming out stories in celebration of National Coming Out Day 1990. Press clippings from September 1990 to March 1991 primarily document

Queer Nation

actions in the Bay Area, a significant number of which pertain to the GHOST (Grand Homosexual Outrage at Sickening Televangelists) focus group's opposition to a city-wide "Halloween exorcism" planned by two ministers in 1990. The miscellaneous file contains unattributed, undated notes as well as a Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) survey containing opinions on the use of the term "queer."

The

Title: non-

Queer Nation

SF series

includes materials from other

Queer Nation

chapters in the United States, including a file on the development of the original

Queer Nation

in New York as a response to that city's rash of anti-queer violence during the summer of 1990. This series also contains a file of fliers which were distributed at weekly general meetings. Since these meetings were fairly open, it is unclear to what degree the groups and activities promoted in these fliers were associated with

Queer Nation

, although it is likely that there was significant overlap in some cases.

Subjects and Indexing Terms

Art

Activism

Related Collections

Queer Nation related collections

Title: Brian Bringardner Papers, 1992-16

Title: Gerard Koskovich Papers, 1991-20

[documents related to an attempt to revive the group in 1992]

Title: Bob Smith Papers, 1993-21

ACT-UP related collections

Title: Ephemera files on ACT-UP

Title: Stephen Fish Papers, 1991-19

Title: Sheldon Ramsdell, 1996-28

Title: Bob Smith Papers, 1993-21

Title: Hank Wilson Papers, 1996-2

Other Contemporary Direct Action Groups

Title: AIDS/ARC Vigil Records, 1991-05

Title: AIDS/ARC Vigil II Records, 1994-21

Title: Meg Barnett Papers [Lesbians Against Police Violence], 1989-05

Title: Boy with Arms Akimbo/Girl with Arms Akimbo Records, 1996-41

Title: Forget-Me-Nots Records, 1989-10

Title: Lesbian Avengers Records, 1996-10

Chronological

Box 1

General Meetings

Jul 18 through Aug 15, 1990

Sep 12 through Oct 10, 1990

Oct 17, 1990

Oct 24, 1990

Oct 31, 1990

Nov 7, 1990

Nov 14, 1990

Nov 21, 1990

Nov 28, 1990

Dec 5, 1990

Dec 12, 1990

Box 1

Gallagher Protest, Dec 14, 1990

Box 1

General Meeting, Dec 19, 1990

Box 1

General Meeting, Jan 2, 1991

Box 1

Wilson Inaugural Action, Jan 7, 1991

Box 1

General Meetings

Jan 16, 1991

Jan 23, 1991

Jan 30, 1991

Feb 2, 1991

Feb 6, 1991

Box 1

Serramonte Shopping Center Trip, SHOP, Feb 9, 1991

Box 1

General Meeting, Mar 9, 1991

Box 1

Police Misconduct Actions, SQUELCH, Mar 11, 1991

Box 1

General Meeting, Mar 20, 1991

Box 1

Forum on the History of Activism in San Francisco, Mar 24, 1991

Box 1

General Meeting, Mar 27, 1991

Box 1

General Meetings

Apr 3, 1991

Apr 17, 1991

May 8, 1991

May 15, 1991

May 22, 1991

Box 1

Teaching the Body Queer Series, Jun, 1991

Box 1

Notes Toward a Chronology of Queer Nation San Francisco, May 28, 1991

Box 1

General Meetings, July 10 through Jul 24, 1991

Box 1

HIV Youth Outreach Funding/Achtenberg Action, Aug, 1991

Box 1

Great America (Unofficial) "Queer Day", Aug 17, 1991

Box 1

First Regional Bay Area Queer Nation Meeting, Sep 14, 1991

Box 1

An Open Letter to Jonathan Katz, Feb 15, 1996

Visuals

Box 2

Posters

Box 2

T-shirt graphics (originals)

Box 2

Sticker graphics (originals)

Box 2

Stickers

Box 2

Photographs, Shopping Actions, Aug 25 and Nov 17, 1990

Focus Groups

Box 2

GHOST (Grand Homosexual Outrage at Sickening Televangelists)

Box 2

LABIA (Lesbian and Bi-women In Action)

Box 2

Queer Planet

Box 2

Queer Scouts

Box 2

QUID (Queers Undertaking Income and Disbursement)

Box 2

SQUELCH, Legal Observation Notes, Sep 6, 1990

Box 2

Street Patrol

Box 2

UBIQUITOUS (Uppity BI Queers United In Their Overtly Unconventional Sexuality)

Box 2

United Colors of Queer Nation

Box 2

Miscellaneous

Communications

Box 2

Queerline Scripts

Box 2

Queer Week Newsletters

Box 2

Queer and Out Publication

Box 2

Press Clippings

Box 2

Miscellaneous

Non- Queer Nation San Francisco

Box 2

Other Queer Nation Chapters

New York City

California (outside San Francisco)

Atlanta, Georgia

Lincoln, Nebraska

Salt Lake City, Utah

Box 2

Correspondence

Box 2

Suppliers

Videotape

Box Shared box

Vallco Mall Action, Dec 29, 1991 and Governor Pete Wilson's Inaugural, Jan 7, 1991