Oxford mississippi gay bar

At least, no one from the devoutly Mormon household in which she grew up on the West Coast. Each month, we share a new article highlighting a scholar who we think has made a particularly important contribution to our understanding of the queer southern past. Her buoyant enthusiasm shines through as she gestures avidly, grinning ear to ear, pumping her fist, moving around her chair with infectious energy.

And if you bar to be passing through Water Valley, Mississippi, on a Saturday, be sure to swing through the queer feminist bookstore that she co-founded in her town of not quite 4, people. I caught up with Dr. Harker via Zoom one sunny spring afternoon and fell into an enthusiastic dialogue that stretched longer than either of us had imagined, as I learned about the fascinating oxford of how a passionate group of lesbian writers and publishers sparked a southern feminist literary renaissance whose legacy is still with us today.

Her first encounter with the queer South was an unexpected one. Later, her parents unwittingly took her to the Flying Biscuit, a cafe that turned out to be lesbian-owned and chock full of friendly LGBTQ folks. It made an impression. Years later, when she decided to take the position at the Gay of Mississippi and moved down to Oxford, she immersed herself in that queer southern world.

She eventually found hers when a straight colleague introduced her to a lesbian student, who invited her to a private mississippi where a large group of lesbians gathered every Saturday to watch football together.

Historians of the Queer South: Jaime Harker’s Lesbian Literary Renaissance

Once folks got to know her, she plugged into broader networks and settled into a fulfilling queer life with a southern twist. The other entry point came through reading historians of the queer South, most notably John Howardwhose classic Men Like That: A Queer Southern History offers a groundbreaking portrait of gay Mississippi life.

As she settled into her position, she began teaching a newly created gay and lesbian literature class. Gay deeper into bar literature, she noticed that Naiad Presswhich during the late twentieth century was the largest lesbian feminist press in the world, had been based in Florida. Her curiosity was piqued.

The book documents a remarkable generation of southern lesbian authors and publishers who participated in the Women in Print movement, a DIY feminist literary renaissance. In an era before the internet and social media, books and print magazines could be enormously influential in circulating radical ideas and creating countercultures, and lesbians in the South were determined to use the printed word to change the world.

What strikes Harker most about the authors and publishers of this era is their energy and gusto, a spirit of defiant joy. Re-examining the South through the lens of this movement and its writers challenges conventional stereotypes about the region. Instead, these women participated in radical, intersectional politics, unapologetically explored sex and desire, confronted gender roles, and rocked the boat in countless ways.

Their work also pushed sexual boundaries. Harker remembers back in the s thinking of lesbian feminism as moralistic, rigid, and out of date. Her account also complicates some of the ways even the queer South has been portrayed. The writing published by southern lesbians during this period spanned many genres.

In addition to their networks of publishers and bookstores in oxford cities, mississippi movement also drew on rural communes where women lived together collectively. She shares a story of when lesbian author Minnie Bruce Pratt came to Oxford for a reading. After the event, Harker joined Pratt and a gaggle of local lesbians at a local restaurant.