The GALA – Queer Archive (previously know as the Gay and Lesbian Memory in Action), also known by its acronym, GALA, is an organization that documents social and legal history of

LGBTIQA+ ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term is ...

individuals and organizations in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

and attempts to correct prevailing

stereotypes In social psychology, a stereotype is a generalized belief about a particular category of people. It is an expectation that people might have about every person of a particular group. The type of expectation can vary; it can be, for example ...

and misperceptions about same-sex relationships in Africa.

The organization

GALA was formed in 1997 as an offshoot of the South African History Archives, it was fashioned after Homodok in Netherlands and the

Lesbian Herstory Archives The Lesbian Herstory Archives (LHA) is a New York City-based archive, community center, and museum dedicated to preserving lesbian history, located in Park Slope, Brooklyn. The Archives contain the world's largest collection of materials by and a ...

in U.S. The name of the organization was previously known as The Gay and Lesbian Archives of South Africa from where it got the acronym GALA. In 2007, the name was changed to its present form. The archives of GALA is located at the Historical Papers department of the William Cullen Library at

University of the Witwatersrand The University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg (), is a multi-campus South African Public university, public research university situated in the northern areas of central Johannesburg. It is more commonly known as Wits University or Wits ( o ...

. The archives contains social, political and constitutional aspects of LGBTIQA+ lives in South Africa. Documents in the archives include legal notes, oral history of LGBT in South Africa, records of South African LGBT organizations, intimate documents submitted by individuals and photographs.

Projects A project is any undertaking, carried out individually or collaboratively and possibly involving research or design, that is carefully planned to achieve a particular goal. An alternative view sees a project managerially as a sequence of even ...

GALA organizes and participates in educational programs and training that encourages equality in South Africa. In the late 1990s, it developed an

oral history Oral history is the collection and study of historical information about individuals, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews. These interviews are conducted with people wh ...

project partly to improve the stories of lesbians in its archives. Another project, African Women's Oral History was initiated in 2003 to include Southern and Eastern African countries. In May 2015, it coordinated a workshop to promote equality in the workplace and raise awareness about homophobia in the workplace. GALA also publishes writing by and about LGBT people under the imprint MaThoko's Books. Founded in 2011, the imprint has published a number of books, including ''Queer Africa: New and Collected Fiction'' which won the 2014

Lambda Literary Award Lambda Literary Awards, also known as the "Lammys", are awarded yearly by Lambda Literary to recognize the crucial role LGBTQ writers play in shaping the world. The Lammys celebrate the very best in LGBTQ literature.The awards were instituted i ...

for an LGBT anthology. MaThoko's Books is named for a South African woman who ran an illegal tavern in

KwaThema KwaThema is a township south-west of Springs in the district of Ekurhuleni, Gauteng, South Africa. It was established in 1951 when Africans were forcibly removed from Payneville because it was considered by the apartheid government to be too clos ...

in the 1980s and 1990s. The tavern became noteworthy as the headquarters of the Gay and Lesbian Organization of the Witwatersrand, an LGBT activism organisation founded by South African activists

Simon Nkoli Simon Tseko Nkoli (26 November 1957 – 30 November 1998) was an anti-apartheid, gay rights and AIDS activist in South Africa. Nkoli was born in Soweto in a seSotho-speaking family. Nkoli became a youth activist against apartheid, joining th ...

, Beverly Ditsie and

Linda Ngcobo Linda may refer to: As a name * Linda (given name), a female given name (including a list of people and fictional characters so named) * Linda (singer) (born 1977), stage name of Svetlana Geiman, a Russian singer * Anita Linda (born Alice Lake ...

References

External links

* {{official website, https://www.gala.co.za/ LGBT culture in South Africa LGBT organisations in South Africa Anti-bullying campaigns LGBT and suicide