Lecture on American gay history set

George Chauncey will deliver the first Mosse Lecture in Gay and Lesbian History at the State Historical Society of Wisconsin in Madison Monday, April 23, at 4:30 p.m.

In his free public presentation, “The History of the Closet,” Chauncey will discuss how the gay liberation movement of the early 1970s argued that “coming out of the closet” was both a moral imperative and a key to personal integrity and psychological health in ways that were as shocking at the time as they are familiar today.

But the very success of the movement has made us forget how many gay people at the time rejected the demand to come out and the very idea that they inhabited a “closet” fraught with shame and dishonesty, Chauncey says.

This lecture explores gay life and consciousness on both sides of this generational divide, and argues that the history of the closet – as a concept and set of social practices – provides us with a key to understanding the cultural politics of the 1960s.

Chauncey, professor of history at the University of Chicago, is the author of the award-winning volume “Gay New York ” (1994). His Madison presentation will be the first in an ongoing series sponsored by the George L. Mosse bequest for gay and lesbian history. Chauncey’s presentation will be followed by a reception in the State Historical Society lobby.

For more information, contact James Steakley, (608) 262-9750, steakley@facstaff.wisc.edu, or John Tortorice, (608) 265-2505 jtortorice@library.wisc.edu.