Working with girls
1984
“When I was doing my research at University,
I was interested in young women and the transition of school to work.
The professor at the Centre for Contemporary Studies was famous for
this, but his work was all about lads, so I did this research on girls.
Eventually through some mad classist thing, I thought, writing about
these young women isn’t the point, do the work, so I got involved with
one of the earliest girls only nights, nationally, at a youth club in
Acocks Green. I and my supervisor for my thesis, before I decided I
wouldn’t bother writing it, established this girls’ night, and it was
entirely staffed by lesbians, we didn’t say so though a few people
might have guessed. Every Friday night before we went to the Old Mo,
half a dozen of us, went down. It was as simple as saying ‘Do you know
how to play pool?’ and they’d say ‘We’ve watched loads of times’ and
that summed it up. Gradually we built a lot of support for the Girls'
Night, some of the women who worked on the other nights came along and
they liked it. It was really interesting doing that area of work and it
got well established as a regular night”.
Contributed by: Trisha McCabe, 51