(In)visible studs and imagned archives: Finding and Exploring Black Masculine Lesbians Perceptions and Search for Heritage and Identity

Sammanfattning

In recent years there has been a rise in discourses about heritage and archival practices. The same conversations highlight how black and queer communities are particularly affected by what archival practices means, does and perpetuates. By examining black masculine lesbian’s perceptions and search for history and heritage this paper argues through theories of embodiment, orientation and disidentification as well as history that black lesbian masculinity has distinctive ways of understanding and relating to their history. The participants illustrate how black masculine history is shaped by real and material voids. These distinctive ways of understanding history further shapes where and through what or whom they find representations and thus how reactivating history today is done.The thesis explores why claiming identities matters, how one embodies black lesbian masculinity and furthermore in what ways and who the participants imagine to be aligned with. In addition, considering why history and heritage matters as well as where knowledge comes from the study finds “Body as archive” as a useful tool to understand how the participants embody and carry history as well as activate it in contact with other comparable or reachable bodies. Consequently, the study is concerned with themes of race, gender, sexuality and history. The material is gathered using longer semi-structured and informal interviews and a diary study alongside autoethnography to center the voices and narratives of black masculine lesbians. Since the eight participants live in various countries on both the European and American continent (all with ties to the global majority) the thesis is written in English.