Joan Nestle Oral History (1991-1992)
Scope and Contents
In the first interview from 1991, Melissa Thomas talks to Joan Nestle about her role in the Queens College Seek Program; the Lesbian Herstory Archives; her writing career; and her background as a Queens College student and as a lesbian and feminist. Nestle details her experience with the Queens College SEEK community and her lesbian feminist community. She reflects on the negative and positive aspects of teaching a multicultural program in an all white environment, discusses her illness and the development of her writing career.
In the second interview from 1992, Melissa Thomas talks to Joan Nestle about her writing career, her upbringing, her relationship with her mother and most especially her dear friend Mabel Hampton. Nestle also talks about the difficulty of being a lesbian in the 1950's through the 1970's and about discovering that she was a lesbian.
Timecode outlines which provide more detail on topics covered in the interviews are available to researchers upon request.
Dates
- 1991 - 1992-03-07
Creator
- Nestle, Joan (Interviewee, Person)
Access
Digital files will be shared upon request. Researchers must first fill out a digital reproduction request form. Please email QC.archives@qc.cuny.edu for more information.
Conditions Governing Use
Interview shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). Users are free to share or adapt the material for non-commercial purposes, as long as they meet the terms of the license. See license details at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/.
Biographical / Historical
Joan Nestle was born in the Bronx in 1940. After graduating from Queens College and receiving her M.A. in English from NYU, she began to teach writing. She was active in protesting against the House Un-American Activities Committee, the Vietnam War, segregation and apartheid, and supporting civil rights, women’s rights, and Gay Liberation. She helped launch the Gay Academic Union in 1972 and founded the Lesbian Herstory Archive in 1973, a rich collection of documents and memorabilia of lesbian history and culture. Nestle is the author of A Fragile Union (1998) and A Restricted Country (1988). Her other publications include Women on Women: An Anthology of American Lesbian Short Fiction and The Persistent Desire: A Femme-Butch Reader. She currently resides in Australia with her partner.
Extent
3 Digital Files (Two interviews: Interview 1 is comprised of 1 digital file; Interview 2 is comprised of 2 digital files.) ; Duration of Interview 1: 00:21:36 Duration of Interview 2: 01:28:00
Language of Materials
English
Immediate Source of Acquisition
These interviews were originally conducted for a course on women and oral history taught by Queens College English Professor Bette Weidman. The casette tapes are part of the Bette Weidman Oral History Papers: https://qcarchives.libraryhost.com/repositories/2/resources/46. Additionally, Joan Nestle signed a Deed of Gift in 2014 for the interviews to become part of the Queens College Special Collections and Archives, and a Queens Memory consent form in 2020, giving permission for the interview to be archived as part of the Queens Memory Project under a Creative Commons license.
Processing Information
These interviews with Joan Nestle were conducted by Melissa Thomas in 1991 and 1992. Two Oral History Interview Timecode documents are available as well.
Creator
- Nestle, Joan (Interviewee, Person)
- Thomas, Melissa (Interviewer, Person)
- Title
- Joan Nestle Oral History (1991-1992)
- Status
- In Progress
- Author
- Kuba Pieczarski
- Date
- 2020-11-16
- Description rules
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
- Language of description
- Undetermined
- Script of description
- Code for undetermined script
- Language of description note
- English
Repository Details
Part of the Queens College (New York, N.Y.) Special Collections and Archives Repository
Queens College Library, CUNY
Benjamin Rosenthal Library RO317
65-30 Kissena Boulevard
Flushing 11367 USA us
QC.Archives@qc.cuny.edu
