in 2023, i was lucky to receive the arquives brian king fabulous researcher award and spend several months at the arquives creating a queer zine collection. with lots of guidance from the arquives staff and volunteers, i flipped my way through the entire lgbtq+ serials collection, pulling materials i thought might be zines.
the main challenge (besides time!) was OF COURSE TRYING TO DEFINE WHAT EXACTLY IS A ZINE. MANY OF THE SERIALS - MADE BY SMALL QUEER GROUPS, COLLECTIVES, OR INDIVIDUALS - MIGHT BE ZINES! I HAD TO WORK OUT A POSSIBLE DEFINITION FOR THE ELUSIVE TERM/BEING/CREATION/MONSTROSITY CALLED 'ZINE.'
the collection is still under construction and will come with a zine-guide-zine to help navigate the boxes and boxes of zines. (stay tuned for more soon!)
But, in the meantime, I made a small zine as a thank you to all the wonderful folks at the arquives who helped bring this zine collection to life. <3
check it out below:
