Alan Turing recalled at the 2014 Stonewall Lecture
A leading scholar of Cultural History and Sexuality Studies has delivered the third Stonewall Lecture in Humanities. Professor Laura Doan from the University of Manchester addressed the audience 'On the Entanglements of Queer Memory and History: The Case of Alan Turing'. It was chaired by Mark Cornwall, Professor of Modern European History.
The arrest of the brilliant mathematician and wartime codebreaker in 1952 on charges of ‘gross indecency’ and his barbaric punishment (chemical castration in lieu of prison) is remembered more than 50 years later. Professor Doan used Turing, recently pardoned by the British government, as ‘a case study to prise memory, time and history apart, while also leaving them intertwined and messy’.
The Southampton Stonewall Lecture is an annual lecture devoted to the history of homosexuality or lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual (LGBT) history. Its purpose is to educate the present about the past; to showcase thinking and research about LGBT history; and to enhance the University of Southampton’s remit of promoting sexual diversity in the regional community.
The inaugural Stonewall Lecture was given in March 2012 by Angela Mason, former executive director of the Stonewall charity. Her talk, drawing a large audience, was entitled: ‘Twenty-Five Years On: The Fight for LGBT Rights in the UK’. The 2013 lecture 'Gay Culture in Postwar New York: Community Creation and Conflict' was given by Professor George Chauncey from Yale.
A collection was made for the charity Stonewall at the end of the talk.
To listen to an interview with Professor Laura Doan please click on the lick to the right of this page.