Our Dyke Histories

Come for the history; stay for the revolution, gossip, and desire that built it. 🤌 About Us :: Decade by decade , Our Dyke Histories dives deep into the living, breathing past and present of lesbian, queer, bisexual, trans, & nonbinary communities. Each season traces how we made space for ourselves—sometimes in bars, bookstores, and protests; sometimes in basements, alleyways, and prisons; & always against the odds. Host :: Our Dyke Histories is hosted by historian, geographer, and environmental psychologist Dr. Jack Jen Gieseking , and produced in collaboration with Sinister Wisdom , the oldest lesbian multicultural literary and art journal. Season One :: Our first season traces the history of dyke bars* - yes, with an asterisk - including lesbian bars, queer parties, & trans hangouts . Before Pride marches and hashtags , there were bars, parties, and whispered invitations that built whole worlds. Our Dyke Histories uncovers the stories of the women, trans, and nonbinary people who turned repression into resistance and nightlife into liberation. Join Our Community :: Want to be part of our community? We'd love to have you. 😏 Come comment, connect, and get your gayme on! Newsletter to your inbox: Jack's Queer Geographies newsletter with detailed takes on each episode, & more about lezbiqueertrans spaces across time Instagram for more dyke visuals and stories @ourdykehistories Read and follow our co-producer and collaborator, Sinister Wisdom Email us at ourdykehistories@gmail.com Donate :: Subscribe and/or donate to the fabulous, in-print Sinister Wisdom , a multicultural lesbian literary & art journal founded in 1976. Sinister Wisdom recognizes the power of language and art to create radical, empowering, resilient, and joyous sanctuaries that build and sustain vibrant lesbian futures. What Does Our Tarot Reading Say about What's Next? :: In future seasons , we will move decade by decade through other defining places, objects, and ideas in lesbian, bi, queer, and trans history—mapping the worlds we’ve made and the futures we’re still imagining. Funny and fierce, sexy and smart, and full of dyke spirit, this podcast isn’t nostalgia—it’s a survival guide disguised as a love letter.

Our Dyke Histories is a history podcast hosted by Unknown Host, with 0 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Unknown Host hosts Our Dyke Histories, a history show with 0 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  Episode #20

  The Party on Tuesday: The Space-Time of Black Queer Women, 2000s-2020s with Kemi Adeyemi and Nikki Lane

  Sep 20, 202639 minS1

  What happens when we age out of the club, but don't age out of wanting to party? In part two of this conversation on Black queer women and Black trans folks , Jack Gieseking talks with Nikki Lane and Kemi Adeyemi about house parties , queer nightlife vs/& queer afternoonlife , aging , and the many ways Black queer people continue to make space for themselves. House parties have always been central to Black queer space-making. At home, you get to decide who is there, what music plays, and what can and cannot happen. For trans folks in particular, the house can offer an alternative to navigating transphobia in public nightlife. The conversation connects contemporary house parties to a much longer history of Black queer women throwing salons , house parties, and rent parties . They also talk about drinking and the growing desire for sober or alternative spaces . They dig deep to explore the racialized space-time of queer nightlife—and the remarkable labor of finding one another when the party keeps moving. It is not just the timing of these parties, but their mobility, though sometimes difficult to find, that allowed these parties to flourish. But this is also Black LGBTQ+ people's labor, to stay flexible, constantly track parties, and be mobile enough to get to them. Because while the spaces may change, and the parties may change, Black queer women and trans people will keep finding a way to them. ** Join Our Community Want to be part of our community? We'd love to have you. Come comment, connect, and get your gayme on! Newsletter to your inbox: Jack's Queer Geographies newsletter with detailed takes on each episode, & more about lezbiqueertrans spaces across time Instagram for more dyke visuals and stories @ourdykehistories Read and follow our co-producer and collaborator, Sinister Wisdom Email us questions and comments at ourdykehistories@gmail.com ** Credits Producer, Editor, Host, & Creative Director: Jack Gieseking Co-Producer: Julie Enszer & Sinister Wisdom Co-Producer & Co-Editor: Cade Waldo Assistant Editor: Becca Moses & Sophie McClain Social Media Manager: Audrey Wilkinson Consulting Producer: Rachel Fagen Music: Our theme song: "Like Honey" by Kit Orion https://www.kitorion.com/ CC-BY-NC-ND 2025. Write to us at ourdykehistories@gmail.com for permission to use any of our content.

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  Episode #19

  Black Queer Women, Parties, and the Right to the City, 2000s-2020s with Kemi Adeyemi and Nikki Lane

  Sep 13, 202656 minS1

  What does it take to make a Black queer space ? What happens when the bar isn’t necessarily the "bar"?And what happens when the space you have is temporary, expensive, gentrifying, imperfect—or all four at once? In this episode of Our Dyke Histories, Jack Gieseking brings together two leading scholars of Black queer women’s spaces. Nikki Lane and Kemi Adeyemi research Black queer women and the politics of partying in Washington, D.C. and Chicago. Together, they rethink the relationship between queer parties, lesbian bars, race , racism , music, and the city. From mega clubs and warehouse parties to smaller bar takeovers and itinerant queer parties , Nikki and Kemi unpack gentrification , race, class, sexuality, gender, and the relentless labor required to create a space where people can actually have a good time. They ask why parties can sometimes be more flexible—and more sustainable—than permanent bars, and how the dance floor becomes a place to negotiate a right to the city. Along the way, we talk about homophobia, transphobia, class politics, party organizing, political expectations, and the imperfect realities of queer community. Because sometimes the politics are messy, the venue is terrible, the rent is rising—and we still find a way to party . Black queer women and trans folks keep finding ways to have a great time. They keep making space. And they keep finding ways to party. ** Join Our Community Want to be part of our community? We'd love to have you. Come comment, connect, and get your gayme on! Newsletter to your inbox: Jack's Queer Geographies newsletter with detailed takes on each episode, & more about lezbiqueertrans spaces across time Instagram for more dyke visuals and stories @ourdykehistories Read and follow our co-producer and collaborator, Sinister Wisdom Email us questions and comments at ourdykehistories@gmail.com ** Credits Producer, Editor, Host, & Creative Director: Jack Gieseking Co-Producer: Julie Enszer & Sinister Wisdom Co-Producer & Co-Editor: Cade Waldo Assistant Editor: Becca Moses & Sophie McClain Social Media Manager: Audrey Wilkinson Consulting Producer: Rachel Fagen Music: Our theme song: "Like Honey" by Kit Orion https://www.kitorion.com/ CC-BY-NC-ND 2025. Write to us at ourdykehistories@gmail.com for permission to use any of our content.

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  Episode #17

  Lesbian Chic, Dyke Politics: Trish Bendix, Katherine Griffiths, & Mairead Sullivan, 1990s-2000s

  Aug 30, 202659 minS1

  Welcome to dyke bars* in the 1990s and the 2000s ! Jack Gieseking joins Mairead Sullivan , Katherine Griffiths , and Trish Bendix to talk about queer parties, lesbian bars, identity, sex, music, and the changing geography of queer life. From My Sister’s Room in Atlanta and Tease in Chicago to London ’s Royal Oak , San Francisco ’s Lexington Club , and Boston ’s Diesel Cafe , they ask what makes a space a dyke bar—and what makes it feel like home. The conversation moves through women’s nights , DIY parties , bookstores , health centers , dancing , trans inclusion and exclusion , aging, race, and the economics of keeping queer spaces alive. They explore how lesbian bars were represented in indie films including Chasing Amy, Go Fish, Bound, Boys on the Side, and The First Wives Club . The episode digs in to lesbian chic , the 1993 Dyke March on Washington , language, and the biomedicalization of “lesbian.” Through it all, bars emerge as spaces of possibility, projection, connection, and community. ** Join Our Community Want to be part of our community? We'd love to have you. Come comment, connect, and get your gayme on! Newsletter to your inbox: Jack's Queer Geographies newsletter with detailed takes on each episode, & more about lezbiqueertrans spaces across time Instagram for more dyke visuals and stories @ourdykehistories Read and follow our co-producer and collaborator, Sinister Wisdom Email us questions and comments at ourdykehistories@gmail.com ** Credits Producer, Editor, Host, & Creative Director: Jack Gieseking Co-Producer: Julie Enszer & Sinister Wisdom Co-Producer & Co-Editor: Cade Waldo Assistant Editor: Becca Moses & Sophie McClain Social Media Manager: Audrey Wilkinson Consulting Producer: Rachel Fagen Music: Our theme song: "Like Honey" by Kit Orion https://www.kitorion.com/ CC-BY-NC-ND 2025. Write to us at ourdykehistories@gmail.com for permission to use any of our content.

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  Our Dyke Histories

  How to Be an Activist: the 1980s from Auntie Valerie Walker

  Aug 23, 202645 minS1

  In this extra 1980s episode of Our Dyke Histories , Jack Gieseking sits down again with one of his favorite people. activist and artist, legendary Auntie Valerie Walker to talk about bars, dancing , organizing , racism , AIDS , ACT UP, the Lesbian Avengers, and the queer joy that keeps us connected. Valerie remembers Garbo’s, The Duchess, Henrietta’s, Cubbyhole, Nanny’s, and the bars where she danced so hard that they paid her to keep the party going. For her, the bar was never just a place to drink. It was where people met across differences, found one another, shared information, organized, hooked up, and made community. The conversation moves from the racism Valerie experienced inside ACT UP to her work with the Lesbian Avengers, including a delightfully thorough protest involving phone trees, Dyke TV, Hershey’s Kisses, and a whole lot of kissing. And underneath it all is Valerie's call to keep building who all lezbiqueertrans people can call Auntie Yes. She leaves us with mic drop wisdom and love: "Joy is a connector." "We deserve everything." And "the bar scene is its own movement." ** Join Our Community Want to be part of our community? We'd love to have you. Come comment, connect, and get your gayme on! Newsletter to your inbox: Jack's Queer Geographies newsletter with detailed takes on each episode, & more about lezbiqueertrans spaces across time Instagram for more dyke visuals and stories @ourdykehistories Read and follow our co-producer and collaborator, Sinister Wisdom Email us questions and comments at ourdykehistories@gmail.com ** Credits Producer, Editor, Host, & Creative Director: Jack Gieseking Co-Producer: Julie Enszer & Sinister Wisdom Co-Producer & Co-Editor: Cade Waldo Assistant Editor: Becca Moses & Sophie McClain Social Media Manager: Audrey Wilkinson Consulting Producer: Rachel Fagen Music: Our theme song: "Like Honey" by Kit Orion https://www.kitorion.com/ CC-BY-NC-ND 2025. Write to us at ourdykehistories@gmail.com for permission to use any of our content.

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  Episode #15

  But Do We Get to Stay?: Sex, Space, and the 1980s, with Sarah Schulman, Katherine V. Forrest, & Valarie Walker

  Aug 17, 202653 minS1

  In this episode of Our Dyke Histories , we keep rocking through the 1980s: sex wars , lesbian bars , gentrification , bookstores , health centers , fiction , and the complicated work of building community . Jack Gieseking talks with Katherine V. Forrest , Sarah Schulman , and Valerie Walker about the places where queer people found one another—and what happened when those places changed. We visit Crazy Nanny’s , the only Black lesbian bar in Greenwich Village, the Christopher Street Pier, lesbian health centers, and the W.O.W. Café . We talk about bars as community, sobriety and the economics of keeping spaces alive, and the ways racism and class shaped who could gather. We also tackle (or are tackled by) the sex wars: the 1982 Barnard Conference on Sexuality , Women Against Pornography (the other WAP), pro-sex feminism , BDSM , leather , On Our Backs , and the essentialism versus social construction debate. We see gentrification begin to rear its head against and with queers just as the AIDS crisis evolves. In the end, we turn to representation and ask the enduring question: do we get to stay? ** Join Our Community Want to be part of our community? We'd love to have you. Come comment, connect, and get your gayme on! Newsletter to your inbox: Jack's Queer Geographies newsletter with detailed takes on each episode, & more about lezbiqueertrans spaces across time Instagram for more dyke visuals and stories @ourdykehistories Read and follow our co-producer and collaborator, Sinister Wisdom Email us questions and comments at ourdykehistories@gmail.com ** Credits Producer, Editor, Host, & Creative Director: Jack Gieseking Co-Producer: Julie Enszer & Sinister Wisdom Co-Producer & Co-Editor: Cade Waldo Assistant Editor: Becca Moses & Sophie McClain Social Media Manager: Audrey Wilkinson Consulting Producer: Rachel Fagen Music: Our theme song: "Like Honey" by Kit Orion https://www.kitorion.com/ CC-BY-NC-ND 2025. Write to us at ourdykehistories@gmail.com for permission to use any of our content.

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