40 minutes | Tuesday, 1 February 2022
Graeme catches up with the chair of SWITCHBOARD and host of The Log Books podcast, Natasha Walker for the start of LGBT history month.
The Log Books are an award-winning history of LGBTQ+ life in Britain as noted by volunteers at Switchboard.
As a helpline for anyone who wants to talk about gender identity and sexuality, Switchboard has been hearing about, and helping, queer life since 1974.
Now held in the archive at the Bishopsgate Institute, the volunteers’ log books offer a unique insight into the range of issues facing LGBTQ+ people in Britain in the 70s, 80s and 90s.
Stories range from police entrapping gay men meeting for sex in toilets, to women losing custody of their children for being lesbians, to people kicked out of pubs for wearing pro-gay badges and to those struggling with their gender identity before anyone had the right language to help them.
The log books laugh and cry with the real lives of runaways and disco-dancers, with isolated fishermen phoning to chat and people unsure about how to have sex.
The logbooks podcast is an award winning project showcasing the UK's untold LGBTQ+ history and Natasha is cohost and Producer. Here she chat's about the Logbooks, giving us an insight into the UK's social history that isn't often seen.