This week was the premiere of Dustin Lance Black's new historical miniseries When We Rise, a chronicle of LGBTQ activist movements from the 1970's to now directed by Black, Gus Van Sant, Dee Rees, and Thomas Schlamme. We are glad that the stories of these brave individuals are getting a share of the spotlight as the miniseries airs this week on ABC. If you want to learn more about LGBTQ activism from the 1970’s and beyond, check out these histories, biographies, and databases from collections on the activists and movements that shifted American politics in the time period.
Movement Histories
Dudley Clendinen and Adam Nagourney. Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America
Jim Downs. Stand By Me: The Forgotten History of Gay Liberation
Lillian Faderman. The Gay Revolution: The Story of the Struggle
Linda Hirshman. Victory: The Triumphant Gay Revolution
Alethia Jones and Virginia Eubanks, with Barbara Smith. Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around: Forty Years of Movement Building with Barbara Smith.
Eric Marcus. Making Gay History: The Half-Century Fight for Lesbian and Gay Equal Rights
Kevin J. Mumford. Not Straight, Not White: Black Gay Men from the March on Washington to the AIDS Crisis
Uriel Quesada, Letitia Gomez, and Salvador Vidal-Ortiz. Queer Brown Voices: Personal Narratives of Latina/o LGBT Activism
Susan Stryker. Transgender History
Activist Biographies and Memoirs
Gloria Anzaldúa. Borderlands (La Frontera)
Kelly Cogswell. Eating Fire: My Life as a Lesbian Avenger
Jeanne Cordova. When We Were Outlaws: A Memoir of Love and Revolution
Karla Jay. Tales of the Lavender Menace: A Memoir of Liberation
Audre Lorde. Zami, a New Spelling of My Name
Kevin K. Kumashiro. Restoried Selves: Autobiographies of Queer Asian-Pacific-American Activists
Mario Martino. Emergence : A Transsexual Autobiography
Renée Richards. No Way Renee: The Second Half of my Notorious Life
Michael Schiavi. Celluloid Activist: The Life and Times of Vito Russo
Mark Segal. And Then I Danced: Traveling the Road to LGBT Equality
Databases
Archives of Human Sexuality and Identity Database (Available from home with a library card)