Archiving Queer of Colour Politics in the Netherlands:: A Roundtable Conversation

Abstract

This roundtable stages a conversation amongst activists and cultural producers involved in feminist and queer of colour politics in the Netherlands from the 1980s to the present. Its primary focus is on the collectives and initiatives that emerged in the 1980s and 1990s, such as SUHO (Surinamese Homosexuals), Flamboyant, Zami, Sister Outsider, and Strange Fruit. The roundtable participants ‐ Anne Krul, Tieneke Sumter, Andre Reeder, Marlon Reina, and Ajamu ‐ reflect on several issues, amongst which the political organising around blackness in the 1980s and 1990s, the relations between queer of colour collectives and other movements, the links between political organising and cultural work, the differences between activism and archiving in Curaçao and the Netherlands, and, finally, the possibilities and limits of archiving queer of colour histories in the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The roundtable also discusses two exhibitions held at IHLIA LGBT Heritage in Amsterdam: We Live Here (2009), on the history of the black lesbian and gay community in the Netherlands, and With Pride (2018), on the history of Dutch sexual politics.