Showcase - Southern Lesbian Feminist Activist Herstory Project

Celebrating the Anniversary of the Herstory Project

May and June 2024 are multiple anniversaries for the SLFA Herstory Project. It’s the fifteenth anniversary of our first Herstory Project planning workshop at Womonwrites. It’s the tenth anniversary of our first special issue of Sinister Wisdom. And it’s the second anniversary of the launching of this website.

We celebrated the publication of our sixth and final Sinister Wisdom volume two years ago. The six special volumes contain a treasure trove of collected stories, interviews, timelines, and photographs from three decades of twentieth-century, lesbian-feminist activism in Southern states. Now, we are focusing on making these edited interviews available online as we continue to add new interviews.

The herstory of lesbian-feminist activism in the South was rapidly being lost as these stories of unsung sheroes were not being reported in any of the memoirs and histories of the women’s liberation movement in the twentieth century.

Posted on May 5, 2024 Posted in Publishing, Publications, and Booksellers Tagged with 2019 last Womonwrites, 30th Womonwrites Anniversary 2009, Atlanta, Barbara Ester, Beth York, Carol Hanisch, class diversity, consciousness raising groups, Corky Culver, descendent of Womonwrites, Duke University archive, Durham NC, education diversity, first womens land community 1972, first Womonwrites 1979, Florida, Gainesville, Herstory Project 2009, Jaye McNeil, Jessica Lenn Chia, Kathy Sarachild, Knoxville Tennessee, Lennie Lassiter, lesbian activity, Lesbian Connection, Lesbian Home Movie Project, Lorraine Fontana, Mandy Carter, Merril Mushroom, Nashville, New York Radical Womens group, North Forty, old lesbians organizing for change, OLOC, Pagoda project, participant led, race consciousness, reading groups, Rose Norman, Sinister Wisdom, SLFA, Southeast, Southern dykes, Southern Festival, Southern Lesbian Feminist Activist Herstory Project, Southern Women’s Music and Comedy Festival, timeline of activism, twentieth century lesbian feminism activism in Southern states, University of Florida Oral History Program, WeMoon 1973, Womens Liberation Movement, Womonwrites, writing groups

Remembering Terri Lynn Jewell: Black, Lesbian-Feminist Poet

Terri Jewell at Womonwrites 1984. Photo courtesy of Rand Hall.

Terri Jewell (1954-95), Black, lesbian-feminist poet, lived in Lansing, Michigan, for the last twenty-plus years of her life, and we are happy to claim her for the South. She grew up in Louisville, Kentucky. In 1984, Terri attended Womonwrites: the Southeast Lesbian Writers Conference in Georgia with the Louisville League of Lesbian Writers.

During her short life, Terri Jewell published one book of poetry, Succulent Heretic (Lansing, MI: Oral Tortuga Press, 1994), and the collection The Black Woman’s Gumbo Ya-Ya: Quotations by Black Women (Freedom, CA: Crossing Press, 1993).

Terri’s book, Our Names Are Many: The Black Woman’s Book of Days (Freedom, CA: Crossing Press, 1996), was published posthumously. Terri Jewell’s poems also appear in scores of journals and are anthologized in collections like A Fierce Brightness: 25 Years of Women’s Poetry, When I Am An Old Woman I Shall Wear Purple, and If I Had My Life to Live Over, I Would Pick More Daisies.

When our Herstory Project editors went looking for women who remembered Terri Jewell, we found her Louisville League of Lesbian Writers friends eager to participate.

Posted on April 3, 2024 Posted in Culture and the Arts, Publishing, Publications, and Booksellers Tagged with A Fierce Brightness: 25 Years of Women’s Poetry, and If I Had My Life to Live Over, Black feminist poet, I Would Pick More Daisies, Jeanine Normand, Kentucky, Lansing, LauRose Felicity, League of Lesbian Writers, Louisville, Maree Dzian Ecrevan, Michigan, Our Names Are Many: The Black Woman’s Book of Days, Pam McMichael, Succulent Heretic, Terri Lynn Jewell, The Black Woman's Gumbo Ya-Ya: Quotations by Black Women, When I Am An Old Woman I Shall Wear Purple, Womonwrites

Southern Sisters, Inc.: Women in Print, a Feminist Outpost

Southern Sisters, 411 Morris St., Durham, NC (1988-1995). Photo courtesy of Melody Ivins.

We didn’t know squat about books. If we’d known what it was going to take, we wouldn’t have done it! You had to be passionate and crazy.

Posted on February 19, 2024 Posted in Publishing, Publications, and Booksellers Tagged with childrens books, Inc. – Women in Print—A Feminist Outpost, Southern Sisters

Rose Norman: Finding Lesbian Community in Alabama

Rose Norman, author, grew up in rural Alabama during the civil rights era. She finally found lesbian culture when she was forty, and it changed her life forever for the better.

Posted on January 22, 2024 Posted in Lesbian Land Groups, Social and Political Groups, Spirituality and Religion Tagged with Aggies, Autobiographies of American women writers in the 19th century, Baptist church, Betty Clemens, Black Womens Autobiography, Bloody Lowndes, British literature, civil rights activism, College Station, Coretta Scott King, Corp of Cadets, director of Business and Technical Writing program, dissertation, DISTAR Direct Instruction Reading Intervention PrograM, English, english composition, feminist approaches to literature, feminist criticism, Fort Deposit, Fort Deposit Academy, fort Deposit Elementary, Fortex, Fun with Quarantina, George Wallace, Haneyville, HBCU Historically Black College or University, Head Start, Huntsville Alabama, Huntsville Feminist Chorus, IBM Selectric typewriter, in store credit, Joanne Braxton, Job Corps, Jonathan Daniels, Judson College, Justine Shrider, Knoxville Tennessee, Literary London, Lowndes County Alabama, Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power PBS, Lowndes County Training School, LydiaBetty Giardini, Marion Alabama, McGovern, Merril Mushroom, Nancy finley, National Television, NOW National Organization for Women, pajama factory, Pam Siegler, privileged, racist, Renaissance drama, Rock Hill South Carolina, Rose Norman, Royal Shakespeare Company, Sacred Heart Monastery Cullman Alabama, Sandra Carpenter, segregated, Sherry Mercieca, Sister Maurus, SNCC Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, South Carolina, Southern Lesbian Feminist Activist Herstory Project, step sings, Stratford, teachers aide, teaching assistant, tech writer, tenure track job, Texan, Texas A&M, Tom Coleman, Unitarian Universalist Church, University of Alabama, University of Tennessee, Viola Liuzzo, violence, Virginia Woolf seminar, Winthrop College, women in American History, Women in European History, Women Spirit Rising, womens college, Womens Getaway Weekend retreat at Sacred Heart