Our History

In 2017, I first walked into Out on the Shelves Library in Vancouver, British Columbia, just a few months into my graduate program there. I was bowled over by the knowledge that I was standing in a room full of books that were for me, about me, and represented me and mine. The fast friends I’d made in my library program all lurked in the stacks after the meeting was over, just to stay in that space and breathe the air of a room where we could truly relax, even if just for a moment. I wanted there to be more of these spaces and resources. More libraries with queer people in mind. More classification systems and cataloguing practices that centered marginalized voices. I learned that there are very few in North America. So I daydreamed for a few years about making one myself.

Five years and a global pandemic later, I was working in digital libraries. During the pandemic, it became so clear how vital and necessary digital services are, and I was able to begin my career in that area as a result. Late at night, unable to sleep, this idea came to me, gathering all the disparate pieces of the thoughts that I’d had before into sharp, beautiful, crystalline focus. A queer library. A digital queer library. Online and accessible to anybody with a computer or smart phone. The privacy of your own personal device and the long-distance community offered by the Internet. All of these pieces made sense together. So I sent a long and rambling voice memo to my friend (and now fellow steering committee member), Erik.

“We could totally do this!” I said, excited, but not completely serious. I’d had plenty of good, fun ideas like this that I’d let flow past me.

“Yeah. We could.” Something in the certainty and clarity in Erik’s voice made me pause. His tone made me stop and wonder if this idea was different.

Over the next few months, we reached out to our friends: a diverse and multi-talented group of people with the varied skillsets necessary to bring an idea like this to life. Our steering committee grew and we settled on the name Queer Liberation Library, because queer liberation is our history and our future.

As we build this library, we hope that it will be a way to bring our community closer together in a time when neoliberal capitalism seeks to isolate us and right-wing extremists seek to eliminate us.

We will not be banned or removed.

-Kieran, Founder