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Object Description
Interview no. | W-0001 |
Restrictions | No restrictions. Open to research. |
Project | W.1. LGBTQ Life in the South: LGBTQ Activism in the North Carolina Triangle Area |
Project description | A collection of oral history interviews on the topic of local queer life, community, and activism from 1969 to the present. Aaron Lovett, an undergraduate student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, conducted these interviews as part of his independent research project in the History department in summer 2014. The study was advised by Dr. Rachel Seidman, Associate Director of the Southern Oral History Program. This study traces the development of queer activism from social organizing in the early 1970s, to the beginning of statewide lobbying and political activism in the early ‘90s, and to recent developments in North Carolina regarding pro-LGBTQ laws such as the NC School Violence Prevention Act and anti-LGBTQ legislation such as Amendment One. LGBTQ activists interviewed include feminist theorist Alexis Pauline Gumbs, HIV/AIDS advocate Carolyn McAllaster, and LGBTQ lobbyist Ian Palmquist. This study connects local and statewide LGBTQ events with regional and national trends, analyzes the nature of the Triangle area’s LGBTQ community in relation to rest of the South, and documents changes and continuities in local LGBTQ life and culture. |
Date | 21 July 2014 |
Interviewee | Batch, Bradley R. |
Interviewee occupation | Unknown |
Interviewee DOB | Unknown |
Interviewee ethnicity | Unidentified |
Interviewer | Lovett, Aaron. |
Abstract | Brad Batch is a UNC alum and member of the SAGE (Services and Advocacy for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Elders) chapter at Raleigh, North Carolina. In this interview, he gives an account of what LGBTQ life was like in the North Carolina Triangle area beginning with his enrolling at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the fall of 1970. He talks about his childhood when he lived in Wilmington, NC, and how homosexuality seemed to be tolerated so long as it was kept discreet. He discusses how LGBTQ students organized on campus, primarily through a small informal group which would be recognized by the administration in 1974 as the Carolina Gay Association. After retelling what his coming out experience was like, and how he was accepted by friends and peers at UNC, Batch mentions that his mother supported him even though she probably would have preferred to have a straight son. Batch also discusses what LGBTQ life was like as an adult in the Triangle area from the late 1970s to the present. He explains how most queer people had to go to bars to meet each other – not just for casual sex, but more importantly for meeting with friends and networking. Three popular bars in the Raleigh, Chapel Hill, and Durham areas that he recollects were the Mousetrap, Capitol Corral, and Blueberry Hill, all of which have since closed. He also mentions how the founding of St. John’s Metropolitan Community Church in Raleigh offered a valuable alternative space for LGBTQ people to meet and associate. Other topics of discussion include: the effect of the HIV/AIDS epidemic on the local gay community, the different responses among gay and straight people, and how attitudes toward being HIV positive have changed. Furthermore, he gives an account of how SAGE Raleigh is meant to offer support to elder members of the LGBTQ community, whose needs can be often neglected. Finally, he offers his opinions on the challenging nature of being LGBTQ in the South, and what the future may hold for the modern LGBTQ rights movement. This interview was conducted as part of the interviewer’s oral history research project on LGBTQ activism in the NC Triangle area since 1969. |
Citation | Interview with Bradley R. Batch by Aaron Lovett, 21 July 2014 W-0001, in the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill |
Description
Interview no. | W0001_Audio |