© Nicolas Döring
Weekend Tips: What to Do This Weekend in Berlin
April 17 to 19, 2026: Events, festivals, exhibitions and more things to do for your perfect weekend in Berlin. more
Das verborgene Archiv
Date details
- Date Tuesday, 12/May/2026 19:00
- Venue Jüdisches Museum Berlin
- Address Lindenstraße 14, 10969 Berlin-Kreuzberg
Public transportation
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Underground
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U Hallesches Tor
- U6
- U1
- U3
-
U Kochstr. (Checkpoint Charlie)
- U6
-
U Hallesches Tor
-
Bus
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Jüdisches Museum
- 248
- N42
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Franz-Klühs-Str.
- 248
- N42
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Zossener Brücke
- 248
- M41
- N42
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Wilhelmstr./Franz-Klühs-Str.
- N6
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Charlottenstr.
- M29
-
Berlin, Lindenstr./Oranienstr.
- 248
- M29
- N42
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Willy-Brandt-Haus
- M41
-
U Hallesches Tor
- 248
- M41
- N1
- N42
-
U Kochstr. (Checkpoint Charlie)
- M29
- N6
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Mehringbrücke
- N6
- N1
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Waldeckpark
- M29
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Wilhelmstr./Kochstr.
- M29
- N6
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Berlin, Blücherstr.
- 248
- M41
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Alexandrinenstr.
- M29
-
Jüdisches Museum
The Closeted Archive
An Evening Dedicated to Queer Biographies during National Socialism
During the Weimar Republic, the neighborhood around the Jewish Museum Berlin (JMB) – along with other areas in Berlin – was known for its vibrant queer culture and nightlife. Magnus Hirschfeld opened the world’s first Institute for Sexual Science near Tiergarten, creating a safe space for homosexual and trans* people. It was later defamed by the Nazis as “Jewish”, forcibly closed and destroyed. With the increasing disenfranchisement and persecution under the National Socialists, many members of the community, including Jewish protagonists, were deported to camps or forced to emigrate.
Together with American author and podcaster Eric Marcus, we will bring their voices back to Berlin for one evening, listening to interviews with contemporaries recorded for Marcus’ podcast Making Gay History. Afterwards, Eric Marcus, literary scholar Janin Afken, and historian Kai* Brust will discuss the challenges of researching LGBTQIA* biographies in archives and museum collections.
How can we reconstruct diverse and interconnected experiences of persecution? Is the term “queer,” commonly used today, appropriate for historical analysis? And how can lesbian, gay, and trans* life stories be traced in archives that often render them invisible through their classification systems?
Eric Marcus
Eric Marcus is an American journalist, founder and host of the award-winning podcast Making Gay History; executive director of the Making Gay History educational non-profit organization, which provides LGBTQIA*-inclusive American history lessons to middle and high school educators. Eric is co-producer of Those Who Were There: Voices from the Holocaust, a podcast drawn from Yale University’s Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies. Eric is author and co-author of a dozen books and a founding board member of the American LGBTQ+ Museum.
Kai*Brust
Kai*Brust is a historian at the Free University of Berlin and a research associate in the project LGBTIQ* Movements as Agents of Democratization: Historical, Contemporary, and Future Resources for Imagining Inclusive and Diverse Democracies. Previously, dey worked freelance on numerous educational and exhibition projects on trans* and queer contemporary history, such as Spektrum des Un_rechts, and were the initiator of the first Stolperstein without deadnaming for a trans person.
Janin Afken
Janin Afken is a literary scholar and staff member at Humboldt University of Berlin in the project Queer Theory in Transit: Reception, Translation, and Production in Polish and German Contexts. She is the author of, among other works, Lesbische Eigenzeiten, Temporalität in der feministischen* Literatur der DDR und BRD, 1971–1983* (2024), editor of the anthology Queere Jüdische Gedichte und Geschichten in homosexuellen Zeitschriften zwischen 1900 und 1932 (2024), and contributor to the project Queer Jewish Lives Between Central Europe and Mandatory Palestine: Biographies and Geographies, 1870–1960 (2021).
Moderation: Anika Reichwald, curator of the JMB permanent exhibition
In cooperation with the Magnus Hirschfeld Federal Foundation
Together with American author and podcaster Eric Marcus, we will bring their voices back to Berlin for one evening, listening to interviews with contemporaries recorded for Marcus’ podcast Making Gay History. Afterwards, Eric Marcus, literary scholar Janin Afken, and historian Kai* Brust will discuss the challenges of researching LGBTQIA* biographies in archives and museum collections.
How can we reconstruct diverse and interconnected experiences of persecution? Is the term “queer,” commonly used today, appropriate for historical analysis? And how can lesbian, gay, and trans* life stories be traced in archives that often render them invisible through their classification systems?
Eric Marcus
Eric Marcus is an American journalist, founder and host of the award-winning podcast Making Gay History; executive director of the Making Gay History educational non-profit organization, which provides LGBTQIA*-inclusive American history lessons to middle and high school educators. Eric is co-producer of Those Who Were There: Voices from the Holocaust, a podcast drawn from Yale University’s Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies. Eric is author and co-author of a dozen books and a founding board member of the American LGBTQ+ Museum.
Kai*Brust
Kai*Brust is a historian at the Free University of Berlin and a research associate in the project LGBTIQ* Movements as Agents of Democratization: Historical, Contemporary, and Future Resources for Imagining Inclusive and Diverse Democracies. Previously, dey worked freelance on numerous educational and exhibition projects on trans* and queer contemporary history, such as Spektrum des Un_rechts, and were the initiator of the first Stolperstein without deadnaming for a trans person.
Janin Afken
Janin Afken is a literary scholar and staff member at Humboldt University of Berlin in the project Queer Theory in Transit: Reception, Translation, and Production in Polish and German Contexts. She is the author of, among other works, Lesbische Eigenzeiten, Temporalität in der feministischen* Literatur der DDR und BRD, 1971–1983* (2024), editor of the anthology Queere Jüdische Gedichte und Geschichten in homosexuellen Zeitschriften zwischen 1900 und 1932 (2024), and contributor to the project Queer Jewish Lives Between Central Europe and Mandatory Palestine: Biographies and Geographies, 1870–1960 (2021).
Moderation: Anika Reichwald, curator of the JMB permanent exhibition
In cooperation with the Magnus Hirschfeld Federal Foundation
Meeting point: W.m. Blumenthal Academy, Klaus Mangold Auditorium Fromet-und-Moses-Mendelssohn-Platz 1, 10969 Berlin
Price: €6.00
Reduced price: €3.00
Booking: registration will soon be possible via the ticket store
Price: €6.00
Reduced price: €3.00
Booking: registration will soon be possible via the ticket store
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© dpa
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© dpa
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© Quelle: Reservix-System
Live-Übertragung: Joschka Fischer – Wer sind wir?
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© Quelle: Reservix-System
Livestream: Joschka Fischer – Wer sind wir?
+++ Livestream in den Kleistsaal +++ Joschka Fischer analysiert die Rolle Deutschlands in Zeiten globaler Erschütterung. Erhöhung des Verteidigungsetats? Wiedereinführung der Wehrpflicht? Europäische atomare Abschreckung? Nach dem ersten Viertel des... moreabout: Livestream: Joschka Fischer – Wer sind wir?
- Date:
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© Eventim
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