Jim Van Buskirk's Biography

Jim Van Buskirk's essays have been featured in various books, newspapers, magazines, radio broadcasts, and websites. Jim co-authored (with Susan Stryker) Gay by the Bay: A History of Queer Culture in the San Francisco Bay Area (Chronicle Books, 1996), and (with Will Shank) Celluloid San Francisco: The Film Lover’s Guide to Bay Area Movie Locations (Chicago Review Press, 2006). He co-edited the nonfiction anthologies Identity Envy: Wanting to Be Who We're Not (Harrington Park Press, 2007; co-editor Jim Tushinski) and Love, Castro Street: Reflections of San Francisco (Alyson Publications, 2007; co-editor Katherine V. Forrest). Jim appears in the documentary Not in Our Town: Northern California, representing “Reversing Vandalism,” the project in which mutilated library books were transformed into artworks. After working as Program Manager of the James C. Hormel Gay and Lesbian Center at the San Francisco Public Library from 1992 to 2007, Jim is currently Book Group Coordinator at the Jewish Community Library. He is working on a family memoir entitledMy Grandmother's Suitcase: Unpacking Generations of Secrecy.