Gay men and the Left in post-war Britain

Gay men and the Left in post-war Britain PDF Author: Lucy Robinson
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 184779663X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 416

Get Book

Book Description
Available in paperback for the first time, his book demonstrates how the personal became political in post-war Britain, and argues that attention to gay activism can help us to fundamentally rethink the nature of post-war politics. While the Left were fighting among themselves and the reformists were struggling with the limits of law reform, gay men started organising for themselves, first individually within existing organisations and later rejecting formal political structures altogether. Culture, performance and identity took over from economics and class struggle, as gay men worked to change the world through the politics of sexuality. Throughout the post-war years, the new cult of the teenager in the 1950s, CND and the counter-culture of the 1960s, gay liberation, feminism, the Punk movement and the miners' strike of 1984 all helped to build a politics of identity. There is an assumption among many of today's politicians that young people are apathetic and disengaged. This book argues that these politicians are looking in the wrong place. People now feel that they can impact the world through the way in which they live, shop, have sex and organise their private lives. Robinson shows that gay men and their politics have been central to this change in the post-war world.

Gay men and the Left in post-war Britain

Gay men and the Left in post-war Britain PDF Author: Lucy Robinson
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 184779663X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 416

Get Book

Book Description
Available in paperback for the first time, his book demonstrates how the personal became political in post-war Britain, and argues that attention to gay activism can help us to fundamentally rethink the nature of post-war politics. While the Left were fighting among themselves and the reformists were struggling with the limits of law reform, gay men started organising for themselves, first individually within existing organisations and later rejecting formal political structures altogether. Culture, performance and identity took over from economics and class struggle, as gay men worked to change the world through the politics of sexuality. Throughout the post-war years, the new cult of the teenager in the 1950s, CND and the counter-culture of the 1960s, gay liberation, feminism, the Punk movement and the miners' strike of 1984 all helped to build a politics of identity. There is an assumption among many of today's politicians that young people are apathetic and disengaged. This book argues that these politicians are looking in the wrong place. People now feel that they can impact the world through the way in which they live, shop, have sex and organise their private lives. Robinson shows that gay men and their politics have been central to this change in the post-war world.

Gay Men and the Left in Post-war Britain

Gay Men and the Left in Post-war Britain PDF Author: Lucy Robinson
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 9781847792334
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 236

Get Book

Book Description
Available in paperback for the first time, his book demonstrates how the personal became political in post-war Britain, and argues that attention to gay activism can help us to fundamentally rethink the nature of post-war politics. While the Left were fighting among themselves and the reformists were struggling with the limits of law reform, gay men started organising for themselves, first individually within existing organisations and later rejecting formal political structures altogether. Culture, performance and identity took over from economics and class struggle, as gay men worked to change the world through the politics of sexuality. Throughout the post-war years, the new cult of the teenager in the 1950s, CND and the counter-culture of the 1960s, gay liberation, feminism, the Punk movement and the miners' strike of 1984 all helped to build a politics of identity. There is an assumption among many of today's politicians that young people are apathetic and disengaged. This book argues that these politicians are looking in the wrong place. People now feel that they can impact the world through the way in which they live, shop, have sex and organise their private lives. Robinson shows that gay men and their politics have been central to this change in the post-war world.

Gay Men and the Sexual History of the Political Left

Gay Men and the Sexual History of the Political Left PDF Author: Gert Hekma
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 9781560247241
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 432

Get Book

Book Description
Chapter authors are internationally recognized scholars who analyze key developments of the attitudes and policies of leftist thinkers, parties, and regimes toward homosexuality in Western Europe, the Soviet Union, and the United States.

Fighting Proud

Fighting Proud PDF Author: Stephen Bourne
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1786722151
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Get Book

Book Description
In this astonishing new history of wartime Britain, historian Stephen Bourne unearths the fascinating stories of the gay men who served in the armed forces and at home, and brings to light the great unheralded contribution they made to the war effort. Fighting Proud weaves together the remarkable lives of these men, from RAF hero Ian Gleed – a Flying Ace twice honoured for bravery by King George VI – to the infantry officers serving in the trenches on the Western Front in WWI - many of whom led the charges into machine-gun fire only to find themselves court-martialled after the war for indecent behaviour. Behind the lines, Alan Turing's work on breaking the 'enigma machine' and subsequent persecution contrasts with the many stories of love and courage in Blitzed-out London, with new wartime diaries and letters unearthed for the first time. Bourne tells the bitterly sad story of Ivor Novello, who wrote the WWI anthem 'Keep the Home Fires Burning', and the crucial work of Noel Coward - who was hated by Hitler for his work entertaining the troops. Fighting Proud also includes a wealth of long-suppressed wartime photography subsequently ignored by mainstream historians. This book is a monument to the bravery, sacrifice and honour shown by a persecuted minority, who contributed during Britain's hour of need.

Wolfenden's Witnesses

Wolfenden's Witnesses PDF Author: Brian Lewis
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137321504
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 316

Get Book

Book Description
The Wolfenden Report of 1957 has long been recognized as a landmark in moves towards gay law reform. What is less well known is that the testimonials and written statements of the witnesses before the Wolfenden Committee provide by far the most complete and extensive array of perspectives we have on how homosexuality was understood in mid-twentieth century Britain. Those giving evidence, individually or through their professional associations, included a broad cross-section of official, professional and bureaucratic Britain: police chiefs, policemen, magistrates, judges, lawyers and Home Office civil servants; doctors, biologists (including Alfred Kinsey), psychiatrists, psychoanalysts and psychotherapists; prison governors, medical officers and probation officers; representatives of the churches, morality councils and progressive and ethical societies; approved school headteachers and youth organization leaders; representatives of the army, navy and air force; and a small handful of self-described but largely anonymous homosexuals. This volume presents an annotated selection of their voices.

Homosexuality

Homosexuality PDF Author: Gay Left Collective
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 1788732405
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 225

Get Book

Book Description
A socialist journal edited by gay men in the 1970s After the leading organizations of radical sexual politics - the Gay Liberation Front and the Gay Marxist Group - imploded or dissolved, the Gay Left Collective formed a research group to make sense of the changing terrain of sexuality and politics writ large. Its goal was to formulate a rigorous Marxist analysis of sexual oppression, while linking together the struggle against homophobia with a wider array of struggles, all under the banner of socialism. This anthology combines the very best of their work, exploring masculinity and workplace organizing, counterculture and disco, the survivals of victorian morality and the onset of the HIV/AIDS crisis.

Sexual Politics

Sexual Politics PDF Author: Stephen Brooke
Publisher: Oxford University Press on Demand
ISBN: 0199562547
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 297

Get Book

Book Description
Explores the complex relationship between sexuality and socialist politics in Britain, arguing that sexuality has been a key, though often neglected aspect of party politics in the last century and a half. It also explores the relationship between the personal and the political in a wide-ranging study of British society.

Singleness in Britain, 1960-1990: Identity, Gender and Social Change

Singleness in Britain, 1960-1990: Identity, Gender and Social Change PDF Author: Emily Priscott
Publisher: Vernon Press
ISBN: 1622739183
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 181

Get Book

Book Description
This book contributes to an emerging field of research, looking at the significance of marital status to debates about identity and gender. It examines representations and experiences of single men and women between 1960 and 1990, using a wide variety of sources, including digitized British newspapers, social research, films, and lifestyle literature. Whilst much-existing work focuses on the early-to-mid 20th centuries (such as Katherine Holden’s ground-breaking work, The Shadow of Marriage: Singleness in England, 1914-1960), this book alternatively examines the impact of the 1960s and the aftermath of changing attitudes to singleness. While Holden and others, such as Virginia Nicholson in Singled Out, focus largely on social status and lived experience (often through oral testimony), the author is just as interested in finding new ways of looking at gender and sexuality. This work starts from the premise that a distinct double standard existed in attitudes towards single men and women, which continued even after the wave of legislation to improve women’s status during the 1960s. Examining these often vastly different expectations reveals a complex web of progress, continuity, and contradictions, highlighting the uneven pace of social change and its frequent compromises and limitations. Using theoretical approaches such as feminism and queer theory, this work explores the impact of changing gender norms on issues including single fatherhood, old maid stereotypes, and experiences of homelessness. It can be used as a study aid for 20th-century British history and gender studies courses, and might also interest both established academics and intellectually curious non-academic readers. The author has made efforts, where possible, to clearly explain her theoretical approaches and interventions for those who might be unfamiliar with them.

Wolfenden's Witnesses

Wolfenden's Witnesses PDF Author: Brian Lewis
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781137321510
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 316

Get Book

Book Description


Peace and Power in Cold War Britain

Peace and Power in Cold War Britain PDF Author: Christopher R. Hill
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 147427935X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 320

Get Book

Book Description
Peace and Power in Cold War Britain explores the ban the bomb and anti-Vietnam War movements from the perspective of media history, focusing in particular on the relationship between radicalism and the rise of television. In doing so, it addresses two questions, both of which seem to recur with each major breakthrough in communications technology: what do advances in communications media mean for democratic participation in politics and how do distinctive types of media condition the very nature of that participation itself? In answering these, the book views the ban the bomb and anti-Vietnam War movements in relation to communication power and media discourse. It highlights how these movements intersected with parts of public life that were being transformed by television themselves, shaping struggles for social change among activists and public intellectuals on the streets, in the Labour Party and in the law courts. The significance of this relationship between media and movements was complex and wide-ranging. Christopher R. Hill demonstrates that it contributed to the enrichment of democracy in Cold War Britain, with radicals serving to innovate and pioneer creative forms of political expression from both in and outside of media organisations. However, the movements increasingly succumbed to news coverage and values that revolved around human interest and violence, feeding into the revolutionary spectacle of 1968 and the turn towards identity politics.