Sunday, April 13, 2014

Out Spotlight

Today's Out Spotlight is an award-winning author of lesbian literature, both fiction and nonfiction. She is the cofounder of the Lesbian Herstory Archives. Today's Out Spotlight is Joan Nestle.

Joan Nestle ( May 12, 1940) was born and raised in Queens, New York. Her father died before she was born and she credits her mother with instilling in her “belief in a woman’s undeniable right to enjoy sex.”

In 1963, she graduated from Queens College. She soon became active in the African-American civil rights movement, taking part in the Selma to Montgomery march and helping with voter registration in the Southern states.

After earning a master’s degree from New York University, she return to teach at Queens College. In the late 1960’s, she became active in the New York City gay and lesbian bar scene. At the time the bars were run by organized crime and riddled with blackmail and extortion. After the Stonewall riots in 1969, she became a gay activist.

In 1973, Nestle helped launch the Gay Academic Union (GAU) to pursue gay liberation in academics. GAU members began to collect and preserve documents related to lesbian history. From this initiative, she helped found the Lesbian Herstory Archives in 1976.


Originally housed in the pantry of Nestle’s apartment, the Archives moved to its permanent home in Brooklyn. It is the oldest and largest lesbian collection in the world, housing more than 20,000 volumes, 12,000 photographs, and 200 special collections, among other artifacts and memorabilia. Since its inception, Nestle has played a vital role in amassing the collection and promoting it to the community.

In 1978, she began writing lesbian-themed fiction focused on the femme-butch relationship. She has won awards from the Lambda Literary Awards and the American Library Association. Her writings have been influential, and her anthology, “The Persistent Desire: A Femme-Butch Reader” (1992), has become a staple in lesbian studies.

In 2002, Nestle’s life was made the subject of the documentary film “Hands on the Pulse.”

Currently she teaches at the University of Melbourne, in Australia, where she lives with her partner, Diane Otto.

The freedom to be sexually expressive, the freedom to be different, is a freedom for all of us.”

19 comments:

  1. So, uh....has the soft serve ice cream truck already gone by way of the ol' Two Wheel Tuesday, to that big Alibi Recycle Center in the sky?

    I thought Austin said:

    Best ice cream in LA. @cvtsoftserve. My buddy Joe. Come join us. Follow him to find locations. I will be at the truck often.

    Does somebody know how to play Taps?

    (As you can see, PG still harboring a tad bit of bitterness over her Two Wheel Tuesday tote bag purchase)

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  2. Not surprising that Austin was given that soft serve alibi, given that Jake was in Dallas for the Final Four Championship on the same day. That's one of the ways in which Austin's Twitter is used for nowadays. To make people think he is somewhere else, when in actuality he is with Jake. They are both big basketball fans so this hookup is no surprise.

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  3. The troll can call himself 1000 different names, it's still the same person it always is.

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  4. That Final Four sighting is a killer, isn't it?

    Let's everybody just gloss right over that one.

    Jake.

    Caught in Texas.

    AGAIN.

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  5. Yeah I'm surprised there wasn't one single photo of him at the game. You'd think someone in the crowd would've recognized him or tweeted about seeing him at the time wouldn't you?

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  7. I knew about Nestle and the archive, but I had no idea it now has over 20,000 books, that'a amazing.

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  8. I guess what you said about Google and OMG is why the troll and/or PR is here 24/7. But why they think after all this time we're going to suddenly fold over anything they say is beyond me.

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  9. Yeah I'm surprised there wasn't one single photo of him at the game. You'd think someone in the crowd would've recognized him or tweeted about seeing him at the time wouldn't you?

    The tweeter didn't say that Jake was necessarily at the game itself. I'd be careful if I was you if you're going to play that card, you could say that for a lot of places that Jake has been seen at for the past several years but not one single photo. And a picture is no guarantee of anything anyway when it comes to that guy.

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  10. Time for another adventure. China and Thailand.


    11:40 AM - 14 Apr 2014 · Details

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  11. Happy Passover to all those who observe on this, the first evening of the holiday.



    This particular year, Passover has been marred by the awful shootings in a Jewish hate crime near where I live. I am frequently in that area so often and it's so hard to believe that these kinds of feelings still exist today. That we, as civilized human beings, cannot coexist peacefully?

    These kinds of events should wake us up to what still exists out in the world and help us to embrace what we have, who we have in our life. In one unexpected minute, our entire life can change forever in a way we never dreamed.



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  12. Time for another adventure. China and Thailand.

    I would think living in the closet would be enough of an adventure on its own.

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  13. AUSTIN NICHOLS ‏@AUS10NICHOLS 14h
    Time for another adventure. China and Thailand.

    Chloe Bennet ‏@ChloeBennet4 2h
    Going to Thailand next week. Can you tell I'm excited? http://instagram.com/p/mzMa90F32A/

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  14. Who's surprised? Meh.

    G'Bye Austin! Bye Bye!! G'Bye Chloe! Bye Bye!!

    You kids just have a wonderful time!

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  16. Did anybody happen to catch this awhile back:
    Maggie Gyllenhaal Withdraws From a Downtown Show to Focus on Broadway Debut
    By PATRICK HEALY FEBRUARY 14, 2014, 4:36 PM

    Academy Award nominee Maggie Gyllenhaal has dropped out of a downtown play in order to focus on making her Broadway debut in October in Tom Stoppard’s “The Real Thing,” several theater executives said on Friday.

    Last year Ms. Gyllenhaal committed to MCC Theater to star in its Off Broadway production of “The Village Bike,” an acclaimed British play by Penelope Skinner that is scheduled to begin performances in May. Then on Tuesday, Roundabout Theater Company announced that Ms. Gyllenhaal would join its Broadway revival of “The Real Thing” in the role of Annie, a plum part for which Glenn Close won a Tony Award in the original 1983 production. By Friday, a spokesman for MCC Theater said that Ms. Gyllenhaal was leaving “The Village Bike” due to newly arisen scheduling conflicts.

    The theater executives who linked “The Village Bike” and “The Real Thing” spoke on condition of anonymity because MCC Theater didn’t want to provide details beyond scheduling conflicts. They said Ms. Gyllenhaal had family and career responsibilities and was reluctant to take on two plays that would run immediately back-to-back. A spokeswoman for Ms. Gyllenhaal did not return a phone message seeking comment on Friday.

    “The Village Bike” and “The Real Thing” are both being directed by Sam Gold. A replacement for Ms. Gyllenhaal in “The Village Bike” will be announced shortly, the MCC Theater spokesman said.


    An actor quitting an Off Broadway play in order to take on a Broadway project is somewhat rare; more common is an actor leaving a play to take on a more lucrative or high-profile role in film or television. Will Chase left Second Stage Theater’s production of “Little Miss Sunshine” last year to join the ABC series “Nashville,” while Finn Wittrock dropped out of Classic Stage Company’s “Romeo and Juliet” for a small role in the film adaptation of “The Normal Heart.”


    For the File

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  17. The only reason I remember it is because her replacement was recently announced and gee, kind of a harsh word from The New York Post about Maggie's dropping out of a play.

    Greta Gerwig replaces Maggie Gyllenhaal in ‘The Village Bike’

    Back in February Maggie Gyllenhaal announced she would star in this fall’s Broadway revival of “The Real Thing” opposite Ewan McGregor.
    Great for Gyllenhaal, not so great for MCC: The actress also announced that she was bailing out of that off-Broadway company’s spring show, “The Village Bike.”
    Boo!
    But there’s an upside: Gyllenhaal’s replacement is going to be Greta Gerwig, making her stage debut.
    This is just the latest installment in Gerwig’s rise: She’s also picked up a high-profile TV gig as the lead in CBS’ “How I Met Your Dad,” the upcoming spin-off of the mega-popular “How I Met Your Mother.”
    It’s quite a departure for a woman who started in the late ’00s in the lo-fi film genre dubbed “mumblecore” and danced wildly in a high-concept Arcade Fire performance.
    Gerwig’s mainstream breakthrough — well, sort of, since the daring movie bombed — was 2010’s “Greenberg,” in which she played Ben Stiller’s love interest.
    Like Parker Posey, her predecessor in hip moviedom, Gerwig has dabbled with mainstream Hollywood: She played Russell Brand’s love interest in the remake of “Arthur” and was a second fiddle in the Ashton Kutcher/Natalie Portman rom-com “No Strings Attached.” She’s even done the obligatory Woody Allen stint (“To Rome With Love”).
    But Gerwig’s real home is ambitious indies — the middle ground between mumblecore’s insular sensibility and mindless blockbusters. Movies like “Frances Ha” and “Damsels in Distress” are where Gerwig’s quirky, appealing sensibility shines brightest.
    If she brings that to “The Village Bike,” the only possible response will be: Maggie who?


    Is it that unusual to drop out of a play?

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  18. Uh oh, sorry for my mess up on the hyperlink. Let me try again.

    Is it that unusual to drop out of a play

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  19. AUSTIN NICHOLS ‏@AUS10NICHOLS 14h
    Time for another adventure. China and Thailand.

    Chloe Bennet ‏@ChloeBennet4 2h
    Going to Thailand next week. Can you tell I'm excited?


    Buh-bye. Don't let the door hit you on the way out, Austie! Since Austin never really works these days, maybe he's thinking of opening a soft serve ice cream franchise in Nonthaburi City or Beijing. I wish him well.

    Hmm. Wonder who funds that kickback lifestyle Austin has lived ever since leaving OTH? LOL!

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