From the Archives
A long history: women in Scottish religion
My name is Ashley Thompson and I’m a current volunteer at GWL. When I’m not volunteering, I’m a history student whose passion is gender history, focussing on expressions of femininity […]
Green Growth from Seeds of Change: GWL has a Green Thumb!
Glasgow Women’s Library (GWL) celebrated its 30th anniversary in September 2021. As we now enter our fourth decade we ‘look back to move forward’ through our 30 Years of Changing […]
Green Growth from Seeds of Change: Green Events at GWL
In her third blog student placement Amelia takes a look back at Green Events at GWL over the last decade… Whilst trying to map environmentalism at Glasgow Women’s Library (GWL) […]
Green Growth from Seeds of Change: In Conversation with the Green Cluster
Student Placement Amelia’s second blog on GWL’s work with the environment… The Green Cluster, at Glasgow Women’s Library (GWL), is a group of women at the library who aim to […]
Green Growth from Seeds of Change: Introduction
Amelia is studying a Masters in Applied Gender Studies at Strathclyde University and completed her placement with us in April. Read her first in a series of blogs focusing on […]
Three Decades of Changing Minds: Project archivist Mae Moss blogs about her first month
Hello everyone! I’ve been working on the 30th anniversary project for just over 8 weeks now and what a ride it’s been! Having volunteered and worked with Glasgow Women’s Library […]
NMRD Sticker of the Month: May 2022
The 1880’s saw the emergence of roller skating, and races developed soon after. Roller Derby was founded by Leo Seltzer in Chicago in 1933. Here, the sport was co-ed with both male and female players, and on the track, all players were equal. It was immensely popular in its day, however, its popularity had its ups and downs (at its height, roller derby sold out Maddison Square Gardens). However, it made a more recent comeback in the 2000s.
NMRD Sticker of the Month: April 2022
For many who wear ‘boutfits’ on the track, the combination of playing a fierce and violent contact sport and wearing provocative outfits shows that women do not need to choose between being sexy and tough: they can be both.
However, many teams, in an effort to break the mould and transform from a fun league to a professional one, have ditched the ‘boutfits’
NMRD Sticker of the Month: March 2022
the artwork has retained its punk-rock origins as does a lot of the team, player, and bout names; many of the names allude to cultural and popular references. This is not unlike wrestling, in which pseudonyms are adopted in order to appear more fierce and threatening to the opponent. In the sticker above, we can see that this Stuttgart player from Germany has taken on the name “Polly Purgatory” to show that she means to send her opponents to a form of hell. This helps to showcase the fun, quirky, and humorous nature of the sport of roller derby.
NMRD Sticker of the Month: February 2022
Glasgow Roller Derby was one of the first roller derby teams to be founded in Scotland in 2007; fourth team in the UK after London Roller Girls, London Rockin’ Rollers, and Birmingham Blitz Dames.