The city of Newark, New Jersey has a fascinating and well-documented history. There are studies of its rich cultural, musical, and literary legacy, its educational system, political life, religious life, immigrant roots, and history of racial conflict. Yet there is one group whose undeniable contribution to the city’s life has rarely been the subject of historical or academic study -- Newark’s LGBT community.

Our conference, “Queer Newark: Our Voices, Our Histories,” which is part of a larger, on-going oral history initiative, will rectify this omission through an exciting and innovative conference. On November 12, 2011, three generations of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender Newark residents will gather to discuss aspects of their lives. The three generations will be organized into separate panels, of LGBT teens, twenty to thirty-year olds, forty and fifty year olds, and sixty and above. Each panel participant will present remarks about their lives as LGBT people in the city of Newark. Discussion topics include childhood, schools and educational life, religion and spirituality, families and parenting, sexual worlds and sexual practices, club scenes, ball scenes, friendship, fashion, sociability, art, and music. Each panel will also have a moderator to facilitate discussion. Historians and scholars of Newark history and LGBT history and studies will be on hand, as moderators and as audience members. The day will include creative performances and resources and will culminate with an evening party.

For more information regarding the conference and/or the oral history project, please email Professor Beryl Satter or Darnell L. Moore at queernk@andromeda.rutgers.edu

See below for Darnell Moore's interview by the Center for Race and Ethnicity at Rutgers-New Brunswick about the Queer Newark Oral History Project.

Special thanks to our media sponsor OutInJersey.net