Donna Graves: Learning from LGBTQ Places: Thoughts on Heritage and Preservation

The Graduate Program in Historic Preservation is very pleased to welcome Donna Graves. In her evening lecture Learning from LGBTQ Places: Thoughts on Heritage and Preservation, Graves will discuss her recent work on LGBTQ historic sites and current efforts to recognize and protect historic places and intangible heritage in the face of the economic tsunami reshaping San Francisco. This event is co-sponsored by the Alice Paul Center for Research on Gender, Sexuality and Women.

Donna Graves is an independent historian/urban planner based in Berkeley, CA. She develops interdisciplinary public history projects that emphasize social equity and sense of place. Her involvement in projects that weave together local histories, preservation, art and community participation began with her tenure as executive director of The Power of Place, which received national acclaim for its ground-breaking work in interpreting the history of downtown Los Angeles through urban design, historic preservation and public art.

Graves been instrumental in establishing and developing California’s Rosie the Riveter/WWII Home Front National Historical Park and recently co-authored an award-winning study of LGBTQ historic sites in San Francisco.  She is an Advisor to the National Park Service’s Asian American/Pacific Islander Theme Study and serves on the Board of Advisors for the National Trust for Historic Preservation and Board of the Rainbow Heritage Network. Graves lectures widely and writes about inter-disciplinary approaches to developing public history projects and new ways of thinking about cultural heritage conservation.