When I arrived for the Pride History Group’s general meeting in August I had no clue what to expect. Having never worked or been in contact with a historical society before, I turned up without expectations of any particular activity or process. The group of members present, who are dedicating their free time to their passion for history and LGBTI NSW were truly inspirational. The atmosphere seemed to be that of an open platform for the ideas of members, where projects such as a lesbian walking tour in Newtown and ‘Queer History in the Pub’, which brings historical topics to the public in a fun social way were discussed. What struck me the most was the interest and creativity the members had in engaging with history, which should in hindsight perhaps not be so shocking in a historical society!
The Pride History Group (PHG), works as a database for researchers as well as conduct their own projects such as published books and pamphlets. One of their major projects at the time which I have ended up volunteering for is the ‘100 voices project’. It collects oral history interviews about ‘the queering of Sydney back from around the 1950’s to the present date, of which part of the content is being made available on their website and where the access of full interviews can be requested. The work that I am doing is, transcribing and logging two interviews from the ‘100 voices’ project. The aim is to create a table of venues, names, movements etc. being discussed that are of relevance to LGBTI Sydney and to indicate at what time in the interview they are discussed as well as what is said about them. The purpose of this is to facilitate researchers to search for key words and thereby easily find the information about them in interviews from the project. It takes a lot of time and careful listening but the stories are really exciting!
The PHG is an open membership group, furthermore a great archive for anyone looking to find out more about LGBTI history! You can find more information on their website: http://camp.org.au/.
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