About us
The Transgender Archives is a part of the University of Victoria Libraries.
We believe that the history of pioneering Trans+ and other gender-diverse activists and the work they have done on behalf of their communities must be preserved. The Transgender Archives is actively acquiring documents, rare publications, and memorabilia of persons and organizations that have worked for the betterment of Trans+ people.
Since 2007, we have been actively acquiring documents, rare publications, and memorabilia of persons and organizations associated with activism by and for Trans+ people. We officially launched in late Fall 2011 at a joint gathering of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, the Southern Comfort Conference, and the U.S. Gay and Lesbian Medical Association, all meeting at the Emory Conference Center in Atlanta, Georgia.
We began with the generous donation of the Rikki Swin Institute collection. The Transgender Archives have been enhanced by other significant donations including the personal papers of Reed Erickson, the entire University of Ulster Trans-Gender Archive collection, and the records of Zenith Foundation of Vancouver Canada, among many others.
The Transgender Archives at the University of Victoria Libraries is open to the public, faculty, students, and scholars free of charge.
Aaron Devor, Founder & Subject Matter Expert
Dr Aaron Devor PhD, FSSSS, FSTLHE, holds The Chair in Transgender Studies at the University of Victoria, the only one of its kind in the world. He has been studying and teaching about transgender topics for more than thirty years. Dr. Devor was one of the authors of versions 6, 7, and 8 of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health's (WPATH) Standards of Care. He also guided the translation of version 7 into world languages.
Dr. Devor is the author of numerous well-cited scholarly articles, and the widely-acclaimed books Gender Blending: Confronting the Limits of Duality (1989), FTM: Female-to-Male Transsexuals in Society (1997, 2016), and 2015-Lambda-Literary-Awards-finalist The Transgender Archives: Foundations for the Future (2014). He has delivered lectures to audiences around the world, including more than 20 keynote and plenary addresses.
He is a national-award-winning teacher, an elected member of the International Academy of Sex Research, and an elected Fellow of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality. Dr. Devor, a trans man, is the Founder and Subject Matter Expert of the world's largest Transgender Archives, a former Dean of Graduate Studies (2002-2012), and a professor of sociology at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, Canada.
Lara Wilson
Lara Wilson is director of special collections and university archivist at the University of Victoria. Lara holds a master of arts degree (art history and visual studies) from UVic and a master of archival studies from the University of British Columbia. She is chairperson of the Canadian Council of Archives.
Michael Radmacher
Michael is a librarian who originates from Treaty 4 territory in Saskatchewan. He relocated to UVic in 2009 to complete his MA in Political Science. In 2010 he completed his award-winning thesis and joined UVic Libraries where he began volunteering for the Transgender Archives starting in 2014. In 2016, Michael completed his Masters of Library and Information Science degree.
Michael worked with the Chair in Transgender Studies from its launch in 2016 to 2025. He now serves as the Transgender Archives Metadata Librarian at UVic Libraries.
Email: mikerad@uvic.ca