Queer as German Folk: exhibn at the Gay Mm Berl | History Workshop

Contents:

• SCHWUL MM (GAY MM)
• BERL MM SHEDS LIGHT ON GAY HISTORY GERMANY
• BERL GAY MM
• QUEER AS GERMAN FOLK: EXHIBN AT THE GAY MM BERL

SCHWUL MM (GAY MM)

Found 1985, the Gay Mm has been showg curated art as well as has displayed treasur om s own llectn temporary special exhibns ever sce.

The followg year, the "Associatn of Friends of a Gay Mm Berl" is formed wh a change of venue: a mm wh a library and archive is stalled a buildg belongg to AHA, a gay rights workg group.

BERL MM SHEDS LIGHT ON GAY HISTORY GERMANY

In the summer of 1984, the legendary exhibn Eldorado – the History, Everyday Life and Culture of Homosexual Women and Men 1850-1950 took place the Berl Mm, curated by the three iators llaboratn wh a group of lbian activists. In the offic of the “Allgemee Homosexuelle Arbesgemeschaft AHA” (General Homosexual Workg Group) Friedrichstraße, the foundatn was laid for a mm, a library and an archive.

BERL GAY MM

The German Historil Mm, Berl and the Schwul Mm are jotly prentg “Homosexualy_i, ” which explor the gay history, polics, and culture Germany. The exhibn shows how same-sex and non-nformist genr inti were crimalized by succsive ernments over the last 150 years, pathologized by medice, and how gays were driven to the g of society.

QUEER AS GERMAN FOLK: EXHIBN AT THE GAY MM BERL

In ntrast to the social reprsn suffered by the German gay muny, the exhibn also documents the liberatn movement of gay men and lbian women, which succsfully changed social perceptns on same-sex relatnships and genr inty.

“In the exhibn ‘Homosexualy_i’, the Dtsch Historisch Mm is grapplg wh this important disurse for the first time s nearly 30-year history. Still, he had an effect: a few liberal-md lleagu accepted his notn of an nate gay inty, and a Bavarian official privately nfsed to siar yearngs. The tle of the chapter, “The German Inventn of Homosexualy, ” telegraphs a prcipal argument of the book: although same-sex love is as old as love self, the public disurse around , and the polil movement to w rights for , arose Germany the late neteenth and early twentieth centuri.

This msage may surprise those who believe that gay inty me of age London and New York, sometime between the Osr Wil trials and the Stonewall rts. Beachy, a historian who teach at Yonsei Universy, Seoul, ends his book by notg that Germans hold gay-pri celebratns each June on what is known as Christopher Street Day, honor of the street where the Stonewall prott unfold. ” In the eighteen-eighti, a Berl police missner gave up prosecutg gay bars and stead stuted a policy of bemed tolerance, gog so far as to lead tours of a growg mimon.

By the begng of the twentieth century, a non of gay lerature had emerged (one early advote ed the phrase “Stayg silent is ath, ” nearly a century before aids activists ed the slogan “Silence = Death”); activists were bemoang negative pictns of homosexualy (Thomas Mann’s “Death Venice” was one target); there were bat over the ethics of outg; and a schism opened between an clive, mastream factn and a more rto, anarchistic wg.

In 1929, the Reichstag moved toward the crimalizatn of homosexualy, although the chaos ed by that fall’s stock-market crash prevented a fal did all this happen Germany? The towerg legacy of German ialism and Romanticism, which helps to expla why the gay-rights movement took root Germany, has self bee somewhat obscure, pecially outsi the German school system.