Beyond the Rainbow
LGBT+ History Month
The Library is joining in with campus celebration of LGBT+ History Month by displaying six different LGBT+ Pride Flags across the Library building.
You can read about the origins of these various flags to discover their rich history and symbolic meanings.
Rainbow Pride Flag
Perhaps the most widely recognised symbol of the LGBT+ community is the LGBT+ Rainbow flag, designed by Gilbert Baker in 1978 and first appeared in the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade on June 25th that year. Baker taught himself to sew when he was honourably discharged from the army in 1970, shortly after he met the first openly gay American politician Harvey Milk in 1974, who asked him to create a symbol which represented the gay community. It is rumoured that Baker took his inspiration for the rainbow theme of the flag from Judy Garland’s famous song “Over the Rainbow” from The Wizard of Oz.
Thirty volunteers helped to hand-dye and stitch the two flags flown at the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade. This was not however the original flag Baker created, the first had eight stripes, hot pink representing sex, and turquoise representing magic and art, these colours were dropped due to the inaccessibility of the dyes needed. In the 1980s the flag had an additional black stripe representing the victims of the AIDS crisis.
People of Colour Pride Flag
Most recently another version of the flag appeared in 2017, hoisted outside Philadelphia’s City Hall the flag included two new stripes, one brown and one black, representing the inclusion of people of colour to the LGBT+ community.
Progress Pride Flag
The Progress Pride flag was developed in 2018 by non-binary American artist and designer Daniel Quasar (who uses xe/xyr pronouns). Based on the iconic rainbow flag from 1978, the redesign celebrates the diversity of the LGBTQ community and calls for an overall more inclusive society. The common colours were based on the natural colours of the rainbow and features of nature. Red is Life, Orange is Healing, Yellow is Sunlight, Green is Nature, Blue is Serenity and Purple is Spirit.
Transgender Flag
Transgender woman Monica Helms designed the flag in 1999 and it made its official debut one year later at Phoenix Arizona’s Pride parade. The colours reflect traditional perceived colours for baby boys and baby girls, light blue and pink. The middle white stripe is positioned as such for those who are transitioning, are intersex, for people who feel they have neutral gender or don’t align themselves with any gender.
In 2018 a consultation on reform of the Gender Recognition Act received over 100,000 responses, with the vast majority in support of the reforms to the Act. This reform sought to improve transgender people’s lives in the United Kingdom, but transgender individuals are more likely to experience threats of physical or sexual harassment or violence compared with the LGBT community as a whole. In the UK one in four people are close to a transgender person, transphobia hurts us all.
To learn more about transgender rights visit the TransActual website.
Lesbian Flag
The Lesbian Pride Flag has been one of the most remodelled pride flags with numerous iterations from various artists. The first was published in June 2000 in the Palm Springs edition of the Gay and Lesbian Times Pride issue, named the Labrys Lesbian Flag. During WW2 Nazi Germany condemned homosexual men and women to concentration camps. These women wore an inverted black triangle badge, this symbol has been reclaimed by some lesbians, just as the pink triangle worn by homosexual men in concentration camps has been reclaimed. The violet colour is associated with lesbians due to the poetry of Sappho.
The "orange-pink" lesbian flag, modelled after the seven-band pink flag, was introduced on Tumblr by blogger Emily Gwen in 2018. The colours include dark orange for "gender non-conformity", orange for "independence", light orange for "community", white for "unique relationships to womanhood", pink for "serenity and peace", dusty pink for "love and sex", and dark rose for "femininity".
Pansexual Flag
The pansexual flag has been circulating the internet since mid-2010 contributing to the unity of the pansexual community. This too uses traditional perceived colours of men and women. The pink representing women, blue representing men and the yellow representing non-binary, agender, bigender or genderfluid individuals.
Intersex Flag
The Organisation Intersex International Australia created the flag in 2013. The non-gendered colours, yellow and purple steer away from binary gender identities without any inclusion of traditional gender associated colours, blue and pink.
Bisexual Flag
The bisexual flag borrows its colours from an older symbol of bisexuality, the two overlapping pink and dark blue triangles, typically known as “the biangles”. When mixed on a pallet the colours turn purple, this led to purple being dubbed a key colour representing bisexuality. The colours represent same-sex attraction (magenta), heterosexual attraction (blue) and attraction to both sexes (purple). This flag was designed by Michael Page in 1998 and is 25 years old!
Asexual (Ace) Pride Flag
The Asexual flag debuted in 2010 and is based on the Asexual Visibility and Education Network symbol in which a triangle fades from white to black, used to symbolise the spectrum of Asexual identities. The black stripe represents asexuality, the grey stripe representing the grey-area between sexual and asexual, the white stripe sexuality, and the purple stripe community.
Agender Flag
The Agender flag employs the use of grey and white in a similar fashion to that used in the Asexual flag, one stark difference being the shocking green stripe through its centre. The green stands for non-binary gender, as green is the inverse of purple, purple being a mixture of pink and blue which stand for a mix of female and male.
Non-binary Flag
Invented by Kye Rowan and debuted in 2014. The flag uses similar non-gendered colours distancing itself from binary gender identities; this is felt from the use of yellow similarly to the yellow in the Intersex flag.
Bear Brotherhood Flag
This flag was designed by Craig Byrnes in 1995 to represent the International Bear Brotherhood community; bears are one of the many LGBT communities with events, codes and a culture-specific identity. Designed with inclusivity in mind the colours represent fur colours of bears around the world. This also reflects upon all nationalities of bears across the world as it has more of a prominent usage across Europe than in USA. The paw print works similarly to the heart on the Leather Pride flag which was designed six years earlier.
Leather Pride Flag
Designed by Tony DeBlase in 1989 and debuted at Chicago’s International Mister Leather event. This unlike most of these flags has become more than a gay symbol for LGBT+ people as it has been adopted by the leather and BDSM community. It also stands in opposition to all the other flags as the interpretations of the colours used and the large red heart is left up to the viewer.
The University of Leicester believes everyone should have the opportunity to flourish in an inclusive environment. We are committed to equality and inclusivity being embedded in everything we do, and are proud to support LGBT+ History Month. Hopefully this exhibition will help inform you on multiple areas of LGBT+ History whilst we all continue to commit ourselves to championing LGBT+ equality as a part of the fabric of the University.
The Library is also committed to expanding our broad collection of inclusive publications. You can recommend titles and view our LGBT+ History Month specific reading list.
Explore our Represent Campaign
Explore our LGBT+ History Month Reading List
Exhibition by Hannah Congrave
