Visiting us from Roanoke College, Dr. Gregory Rosenthal, Assistant Professor of Public History, will give a public talk entitled “Digital History and Queer Voices” on Thursday, February 1st, as well as a pedagogy talk on Friday, February 2nd.
Public Talk:
Thursday, February 1, 2018
5pm
IQ Center (Science Addition 202A)
Pedagogy Talk:
Friday, February 2, 2018
12:15pm
IQ Center (Science Addition 202A)
Register here
Digital History and Queer Voices
Dr. Gregory Rosenthal
History Department
Roanoke College
In 2015, Dr. Gregory Rosenthal helped found the Southwest Virginia LGBTQ+ History Project, a community-based history initiative committed to telling the stories of LGBTQ+ individuals and organizations in our region. Since its inception, the History Project has used an array of digital tools to make queer history more widely accessible to diverse audiences and to place a spotlight on the rich queer history of this Appalachian region. Through community engagement, the History Project seeks to empower queer and trans individuals to tell their stories and take leadership roles in processes of research, interpretation, and historical storytelling. But digital tools have revealed themselves to be both an aid and a hindrance to this work. The internet has simultaneously brought LGBTQ+ peoples together in new and exciting ways while also arguably leading to the loss of physical queer spaces as well as engendering a divide between older and younger LGBTQ+ individuals. As we engage in queer historical research and interpretation in Southwest Virginia in the 2010s, how do we navigate the promises and pitfalls of the digital divide, and the limitations of digital technologies to truly tell our queer stories?
Pre-order Rosenthal’s book Beyond Hawai’i: Native Labor in the Pacific World, coming in May 2018, here.
This event is made possible by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. It is co-sponsored by the Washington and Lee History Department.