For much of history, the transgender experience has been muted, ignored, or erased. This year the Digital Transgender Archive was launched to preserve and share trans history. The massive project was put in motion by K.J. Rawson an assistant professor of English at the College of The Holy Cross in Massachusetts. It includes contributions from colleges, universities, non-profit organizations, and private collections from all around the world. It’s the first time such an extensive collection of transgender history has been made available to the public, and it’s amazing.
Speaking to i-D, K.J said that although the project took two years to complete, the idea of establishing a collection of accessible transgender-related history has been germinating for several years. K.J realized that without an exhaustive resource, individuals and academics’ abilities to research transgender history were considerably handicapped.
Much of the content in the archive had never been digitized, so time and issues around shifting language made tracking it down difficult. Searches for historical documents on the topic were complicated by the fact the word Transgender is not only culturally specific, but it’s also only a few decades old. Most documents they were sourcing didn’t even include the term.
K.J stressed to i-D: “We are careful to emphasize that the DTA does not include materials related to transgender identity, but rather practices of trans-ing gender. This is important because it significantly broadens the scope of the collection and allows us to collect across times and places where ‘transgender’ is not a legible identity category.” This decision is reflective of the spirit of the archive, which is as K.J says is to “further explore cross-cultural experiences of trans-ing gender.”
While the archive is undoubtedly an invaluable academic resource, it also offers a surprisingly ordinary and often intimate look at the lives of trans individuals over half a century.
The digital repository includes materials that date back to the 50s; and among them are event fliers, independent publications and even personal photos. Magazines like Vanguard, Cross Talk, and Chrysalis Quarterly span half a century and include articles touching on everything from Halloween costume ideas, Star Trek, make up, passing, civil rights, gender expression and even the need for a trans archive.
Trawling through the archive can quickly dissolve hours as you’re invited to pour over articles such as TranScript‘s photo feature Sluts a-Go-Go! or Chrysalis Quarterly‘s 1991 article Gender Support in the Computer Age. But perhaps most magnetic are the family photos of people just living their lives. Easily the most familiar face in the archive is that of Alison Laing, the Executive Director of the International Foundation for Gender Education. The archive contains pages and pages of her personal photos—snaps from holidays, formal dinners and in front of the home she shared with her wife Dottie. They’re pictures that could be in your own grandparent’s albums — not of people trying to make history, but rather be a visible part of it.
Credits
Text Wendy Syfret
All images courtesy of the Digital Transgender Archive