NOTCHES Blog
@notchesblog.bsky.social
NOTCHES is a collaborative and international history of sexuality blog that aims to get people inside and outside the academy thinking about histories of sex and sexualities in the past and in the present across regions, periods and themes.
New on NOTCHES: Queer Crafts: LGBTQ+ Identity, Politics, and Cultural Expression by Daniel Fountain. Fountain discusses how LGBTQ+ artists and makers use craft to explore identity, embodiment, community, and queer worldmaking. 🔗 Link to full interview: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4XT #NOTCHES #MaterialCulture
Queer Crafts: LGBTQ+ Identity, Politics, and Cultural Expression
Craft is not simply the act of making; it is a powerful site of identity, politics, and cultural expression.
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New on NOTCHES: On the Origins of Queer #Islamophobia in #Germany: From Sex Tourism to Queer Fascism in The Color of Desire by Christopher Ewing. This article traces the historical development of the claim that Islam and queerness are fundamentally incompatible Link to blog: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Zg
On the Origins of Queer Islamophobia in Germany: from Sex Tourism to Queer Fascism in The Color of Desire
The story of the making of homonationalism is also the story of its unmaking.
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New on NOTCHES: The Roots of the Global Culture Wars over Birth Control by Wannes Dupont How did debates over contraception become internationally entangled with population control, reproductive rights, and the Catholic church? Link to article: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Yp #QueerHistory #ReproductiveRights
The Roots of the Global Culture Wars over Birth Control
A showdown involving the Catholic Church, the United Nations, and Planned Parenthood over the politics of birth control.
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Love queer history? Work with us! NOTCHES is seeking up to two social media editors to join our team. Please visit the posting on our blog to find out more. Link here: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Ym #queerhistory #lgbtqhistory #historyofsexuality #historian #notchesblog #volunteer
New on NOTCHES: Coloring into Existence: Queer of Color Worldmaking in Children's Literature by Isabel Millán. Read the full article here: 🔗 wp.me/p6JJ6S-4WA #NOTCHES #QueerHistory #ChildrensLiterature #HistoryOfSexuality #PublicHistory #BookBans
Coloring into Existence: Queer of Color Worldmaking in Children’s Literature
Emerging out of the history of radical feminist and BIPOC publishers, here are three independent publishers of LGBTQ+ children’s literature.
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New on NOTCHES: The Log Books by Tash Walker & Adam Zmith. Drawing on log books from London’s LGBT+ Switchboard, Walker & Zmith uncover fascinating queer life stories in the everyday concerns, fears, desires, and acts of resilience recorded by volunteers in the 70s-90s. Link wp.me/p6JJ6S-4XY
The Log Books
A helpline that has listened to LGBTQ+ people of Britain since 1974.
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New on NOTCHES: The Lion, the Witch, and the Closet? Friendship and Queer Desire in the Life of C. S. Lewis by Tom Hulme explores queer desire, emotional intimacy, and male friendship in early 20th c. Belfast. Link to article: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Wl #QueerHistory #LGBTHistory #PrideMonth #NOTCHES
The Lion, the Witch, and the Closet? Friendship and Queer Desire in the Life of C. S. Lewis
C. S. Lewis and his friend Arthur Greeves had a queer relationship. This article approaches it with a focus on desire, sexuality, and literature.
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New on NOTCHES: What Franco’s Archives Accidentally Preserved About Queer Life in Spain by Javier Fernández-Galeano. Link: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4VR How did the state’s repressive apparatus inadvertently preserve traces of queer intimacy, erotic life, and dissident desire? #QueerHistory #SpanishHistory
What Franco’s Archives Accidentally Preserved About Queer Life in Spain
The archive was a technology of power that paradoxically ended up preserving the very traces of queer life it set out to eradicate.
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New on NOTCHES: Stephen Brogan examines the history of the “gender bender” in 1980s Britain through the career of the iconic DJ and nightlife figure Tasty Tim. Link to full article: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Ur #QueerHistory #LGBTQHistory #GenderStudies #BritishHistory #1980s #PostPunk #NewRomantic
Tasty Tim and the Gender Benders who made Pop History
Although best known as a 1980s tabloid slur, the term ‘gender bender’ refers to a thriving androgynous youth tribe devoted to alternative music, clothes and nightlife.
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New on NOTCHES: “Come to My Cottage: Queer Pleasures and Female Fandom in the Silent Hollywood Era” by Diana W. Anselmo. Link: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4UE #FandomHistory #Herstory #QueerHistory #QueerFandom #HeatedRivalry
New on NOTCHES: In A Queer Theory of the State, Samuel Clowes Huneke examines a central paradox of today's queer rights movement against intensifying political backlash, and the resulting difficulty of imagining transformative futures. 🔗Full article: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4TO #QueerTheory #LGBTQIA
This Trans Day of Visibility, we invite you to revisit this fascinating 2024 article by Margarita Vaysman about Trans life in Russia: Aleksandr Aleksandrov: New Sources in Nineteenth-Century Russian Trans Life-Writing Link: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4H0 #RussianHistory #TransHistory #TDOV #NOTCHESBlog
Aleksandr Aleksandrov: New Sources in Nineteenth-Century Russian Trans Life-Writing
Aleksandr Aleksandrov (1783-1866) was a Russian-Ukrainian hero of the Napoleonic wars and a celebrated trans author.
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New Interview on NOTCHES: In Sex Work in Contemporary Russia, Emily Schuckman Matthews examines how the figure of the sex worker operates as a cultural symbol, illuminating shifting ideas of gender, sexuality, and national identity across modern #RussianHistory. Link: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4TK
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New on NOTCHES In Looking Through the Speculum, Judith Houck traces the evolution of the US women’s health movement from the 1960s. The interview highlights the complexities of feminist organizing including debates around race, institutional survival, and trans inclusion. 🔗: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4TT
Looking through the Speculum
Women’s bodies were not the only focus of the women’s health movement in the United States.
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New Photo Essay on NOTCHES: A Love Letter to Bolts Nightclub by Stephen Brogan Drawing on rare photographs, Brogan’s essay reconsiders Bolts as more than just a nightclub but a cultural institution that reshaped queer music, media visibility, and club culture across Britain. Link: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4RJ
A Love Letter to Bolts Nightclub
Bolts was one of the most vibrant LGBTQ nightclubs in 1980s London, renowned for its Hi-NRG music and its weekly shows that were at the vanguard of gay culture.
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New on NOTCHES: Criminally Queer: The Bolton 7, an interview with Hugh Sheehan. Sheehan revisits the 1998 prosecution of seven gay and bisexual men charged with gross indecency and buggery for consensual group sex. 🔗Link: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4T9 #QueerHistory #LGBTQHistory #Bolton7 #BritishHistory
New on NOTCHES: Sexuality in Modern German History by Katie Sutton. Sutton examines how sexual 'norms' have shaped key forces in modern German history, including nationhood, citizenship, fascism, and memory culture. 🔗Link: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4ST #QueerHistory #GermanStudies #Gender #Germany
Sexuality in Modern German History
A deep look at shifting views about ‘normal’ and nonconforming sexuality across two centuries, and how these shaped people’s behaviours, politics, and lives.
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New on NOTCHES: The Massage Establishments Scandal: Coding and De-coding Sex Work at the Turn of the Twentieth Century by Jessica Gregory. Link: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4SG #SexWorkStudies #VictorianHistory #Herstory #Censorship #NotchesBlog
New on NOTCHES: Left Out: Boys, Sex, and the Challenge of “Gross Indecency” Records in Irish History by Averill Earls Read it now using the link below: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Sb #QueerHistory #IrishHistory #Consent #LGBTQIA #NOTCHESBlog
Left Out: Boys, Sex, and the Challenge of “Gross Indecency” Records in Irish History
Child sex work is unspeakable, but what do we lose by avoiding those conversations?
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How did a Victorian heart medicine become a cornerstone of queer pleasure and politics? Author Adam Zmith joins NOTCHES to discuss his novel Deep Sniff: A History of Poppers and Queer Futures. Read the author interview here 👉 wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Qi #QueerHistory #LGBTQHistory #NOTCHESBlog #GayCulture
Our Social Media Manager, Georgia, is moving on from NOTCHES. So, in her final #ThrowbackThursday post, she shares with us some of her favourite NOTCHES articles of all time: #histsex #historyofsexuality #queerhistory 1/12
Out today, we have Two More Weeks: The Brutality Behind Brazil’s Reproductive Politics by Isabela de Oliveira Dornelas. Read the full article here: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Oy CW: abortion, death in childbirth, sexual violence #histsex #historyofsexuality #historyofmedicine #historyofscience 1/3
Two More Weeks: The Brutality Behind Brazil’s Reproductive Politics
Cesarean or sin: the politics of saving the fetus in Brazil.
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New post out now! Two More Weeks: The Brutality Behind Brazil’s Reproductive Politics by Isabela de Oliveira Dornelas. Read the full article here: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4Oy #histsex #historyofsexuality
Two More Weeks: The Brutality Behind Brazil’s Reproductive Politics
Cesarean or sin: the politics of saving the fetus in Brazil.
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NOTCHES now has a Ko-fi account! If you like what we do and want to support us, visit ko-fi.com/notches and consider leaving us a tip.
Back in 2021, we posted an extract from the introduction of Joanna Bourke’s book, Loving Animals: On Bestiality, Zoophilia, and Post-Human Love, published by @reaktionbooks.bsky.social. Find it here: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4c1 1/5 #histsex #historyofsexuality
Loving Animals: On Bestiality, Zoophilia, and Post-Human Love
How have commentators talked about sex with animals and what meanings have been attached to ‘bestiality’ or ‘zoophilia’?
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Today’s #ThrowbackThursday, let’s celebrate yesterday’s, #InternationalLesbianDay. Looking back at lesbian history, today we spotlight Kim Racon’s article, Finding the lesbian premodern: Does it take one to know one? Read it here: wp.me/p6JJ6S-qL #queerhistory #lgbthistory
Finding the lesbian premodern: Does it take one to know one?
How can we find out about female same-sex experiences and intimacy in the middle ages?
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Today’s #ThrowbackThursday, we return to the bedroom...or, rather, the counselling couch, with ‘This isn’t so boring if you can get an outside climax’: Dr Joan Malleson and sexual counselling in Britain by Caroline Rusterholz. 1/2 #HistSex #HistoryofSexuality
New on NOTCHES! Illicit Monogamy: Inside a Fundamentalist Mormon Community by William Jankowiak Read the exclusive author interview here: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4PT #LGBTQHistory #HistoryOfSexuality #FamilyStudies #ReligiousHistory #Polyamory #Polyamorous #Mormon
Yesterday was #InternationalMakeupDay and so what better way to spend #ThrowbackThursday than to spotlight some of the histories that are intertwined with makeup. 1/7
In today’s new NOTCHES post, we interviewed Jacob Bloomfield on his monograph, Drag: A British History. Read the full interview here: wp.me/p6JJ6S-4PW #historyofsexuality #histsex #genderhistory 1/3
Drag: A British History
A fresh history of British drag performance in all its ubiquity, glamour, fun, and tawdriness.
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