Queered collecting: Supporting the personal within the communal: A case study of QZAP (Queer Zines Archive Project, Milwaukee, WI)

Abstract

The Queer Zine Archive Project (QZAP) was launched in November, 2003; it is currently housed in a residence in the city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA and has a collection of @2,000 zines. Created and coordinated by Milo Miller and Chris Wilde, the mission of QZAP is “to establish a ‘living history’ archive of past and present queer zines and to encourage current and emerging zine publishers to continue to create. In curating such a unique aspect of culture, we value a collectivist approach that respects the diversity of experiences that fall under the heading ‘queer.’” (“About QZAP”) As numerous scholars have stated, zines are self-published, do-it-yourself booklets, photocopied and hand-bound and shared primarily with other zinesters. Over time, this sharing process has generated some significant collections, many of them community based.

While there are academic and public libraries that collect zines, a community archive is an independent archive, characterized by the involvement of members of a community whose records are actually part of the community collection; they retain control over how the collection is developed, identified, and managed. In initiating the collection, and maintaining control, the community is actively involved in the discourse shaping the identity of that community and creating the potential of presence for that community beyond the mainstreamed culture. This ability to maintain independence is a critical element of the community archive, and the queer archive in particular