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BOOK REVIEW
A Collection of
Lake Wobegon Stories
GARRISON KEILLOR
Adam, Barry D. The Rise of a Gay
and Lesbian Movement. Social
Movements Past and Present Series
Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1987.
$8.95.
The new Viking hardback avaiiabie from
Bull's Head Bookshop 962-5060
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OF
War Resisters League and Real
Women Productions will present
Heather Bishop in concert (with
Sherry Shute on bass) on Saturday,
December 19th at 8pm at the
Community Church in Chapel Hill.
The Church is located at 106
Purefoy Road (take Mason Farm Road
off 15/501 ByPass).
This is Heather Bishop's 6th
album release concert tour--her new
album is "A Taste of the Blues."
Her musical style ranges from
blues, to contemporary folk, to
rock and country & western, though
she is ever-mindful of the overall
creative impact.
Tickets are $7 in advance and $9
at the door (children 12 and under-
$3) general admission, limited
seating. Tickets can be purchased
at the Regulator Bookstore in
Durham and Internationalist Books
in Chapel Hill. Or send SASE with
check to : WRL, 604 W. Chapel Hill
Street, Durham, NC 27701. Checks
payable to WRL/RWP. For more
information call (919) 682-6374.
There will be a post-concert album
signing with Heather at the Lady-
slipper Music table.
VOLUNTEERS
The Durham YWCA is looking for
women of all ages and all occupa
tions to train as Rape Crisis
volunteers. Your time and your
caring really does make a
difference. Women in mid-life and
older are especially encouraged to
apply. Contact: Sian McLean, Rape
Crisis Center Director, Durham YWCA
- (919) 688-4396.
In this slim volumne, Barry D.
Adam presents a synthetic history
of the gay and lesbian movement in
Europe and the United States. He
begins by discussing the murky
origins of a "homosexual people" in
the Middle Ages and then plots the
course of developments from the
turn of the century to the 1940s.
Two-thirds of the book, however, is
spent on the period after 1945. '
Adam is to be commended for the
breadth of his study and the
lucidity of the its argument.
A Canadian sociologist, Adam
adds to our understanding of the
genesis of a gay and lesbian civil
rights movement. He finds the
origins of this movement not only
in developing homosexual sub
cultures but also in changing
legal, economic, and political
structures. It is his aim to reveal
some of the institutional bases
supporting anti-homosexual
practices (i.e. laws, social codes,
economic patterns). But his primary
goal is to explicate the reasons
for the emergence of an organized
challenge to heterosexist domi
nation.
Adam's first point is that
social networks and organization
are what distinguish the modern gay
and lesbian worlds from homosexual
behavior as revealed by anthro
pological and historical examples.
It is not a matter of affectional
preference or sexual attraction
that separates the modern era from
the past but rather the development
of a collective consciousness that
results in a gay and lesbian
sensibility. The best evidence for
this break with the past comes from
nineteenth and early twentieth
century subcultures and the liter
ature of gay writers.
The next step in the road to
liberation was taken in Germany
with the founding in Berlin of the
Scientific-Humanitarian Committee
in 1897. Adam maintains that the
establishment of this overt
homophile and pseudo-scientific
organization gave inspiration to
similar developments elsewhere. In
France, Britain, the United States,
and Germany, homosexual men and
women began coming together in
greater numbers, expressing them
selves more openly, and setting up
forums for the promotion of civil
rights for gay people. This change
in self-perception and the move
(see BOOK REVIEW page 12)
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