“The gay bar as an institution has not died, nor have its cultures ended,” he writes. As Hilderbrand notes on the first page, this book is far from an elegy for a bygone institution. Hilderbrand's work challenges the notion that gay bars are obsolete, shedding light on their continued relevance and the unique roles they continue to serve in the LGBTQ+ landscape. While gay bars have long been celebrated as vital community institutions, there was no comprehensive history of them. This “a-ha moment” led him to embark on a mission to document and understand the vital role bars played in queer communities. Hilderbrand's inspiration for writing The Bars Are Ours came from recognizing a gap in the LGBTQ+ historical narrative. ![]() ![]() Lucas Hilderbrand, chair and professor of film and media studies, takes a deep dive into the history of gay bars in his latest book, The Bars Are Ours: Histories and Cultures of Gay Bars in America, 1960 and After (Duke University Press, 2023). For nearly a century, gay bars have been a cornerstone of the LGBTQ+ community in the United States, serving as a medium for queer communities, politics and cultures.
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