‘A Great Unrecorded History’: LGBTQ+ Histories and Heritage  

Richard Bruce Parkinson

LGBTQ+ desire and identity are embodied in human artefacts across all periods and culture of  world history, from Ancient Egypt to works by living artists such as David Hockney. The lecture will discuss the evolution of a long-term LGBTQ+ world history project at the British Museum in a variety of formats, including the book A Little Gay History (2013), and subsequent exhibitions and trails. It will consider why LGBTQ+ histories are important and how they can be displayed—as temporary interventions or as integrated parts of permanent displays— and reflect on the roles of historians in recent years in presenting this heritage and in upholding human rights. 

Richard Bruce Parkinson is an Egyptologist, who specialises in the poetry of the classic period of ancient Egyptian culture. He was a curator at the British Museum (where projects included the display of the Rosetta Stone and the Nebamun wall-paintings), and is now the statutory Professor of Egyptology at the University of Oxford and a fellow of The Queen’s College, Oxford. Drawing on his museum experience and his work on ancient poetry and its modern receptions, he has also published on LGBTQ+ world history. 

Tickets are free and can be booked online here.