Interview with Cator Sparks, June 12, 2019
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- Title:
- Interview with Cator Sparks, June 12, 2019
- Date:
- 2019
- Interviewer:
- Thayer, Rebecca
- Description:
- Cator Sparks (pronouns: he/him), white board president of LGBTQ youth organization We Are Family, discusses his life as a gay man and his volunteer and professional work. He describes growing up in a liberal family in Atlanta, Georgia, and his difficulties and successes in high school. Sparks attended the College of Charleston in the early 1990s and speaks of coming out in Charleston into an exciting and accepting environment, then detailing his experiences in the rave scene. Along with rave venues, he describes gay bars including Treehouse, A.C.'s, and The Arcade. He discusses his volunteer work with neighborhood associations in the Cannonborough-Elliotborough neighborhood in Charleston and Harlem in New York City. Sparks performed in drag in Atlanta as Spectra Gramm, one of his performances during the Olympics being televised in France, where he soon went to study abroad. Back in Atlanta, he enrolled in American College, finishing his degree in fashion marketing in London. It was there he discovered dandyism, and he speaks of his conversion to it from rave fashion, defining what dandyism means to him, the effect it had on his life, and how it can educate others. He emphasizes how he values working with LGBTQ youth and his experiences volunteering with the Harvey Milk High School in New York City and with We Are Family in Charleston. Sparks describes the impact the 2016 Presidential election had on him, prompting his social action and recaps his professional life, including a description of working in Jeffrey, a high-end New York shoe store started by Jeffrey Kalinksy of Charleston, his freelance writing and his future plans of becoming a life coach. Photograph credited to Carolina Knopf.
- Collection Title:
- South Carolina LGBTQ Oral Histories, Archives, and Outreach
- Contributing Institution:
- College of Charleston Libraries
- Media Type:
- Oral Histories
- Personal or Corporate Subject:
- College of Charleston
- Topical Subject:
- Coming out (Sexual orientation), Rave culture, Dandyism, Social work with sexual minority youth, Personal coaching
- Geographic Subject:
- Charleston (S.C.), Atlanta (Ga.), Harlem (New York, N.Y.)
- S.C. County:
- Charleston County (S.C.)
- Language:
- English
- Shelving Locator:
- Mss LGBTQ-OH-047
- Date Digital:
- 2019-06-12
- Digitization Specifications:
- Mp3 derivative audio created with Audacity software. Archival masters are wav files.
- Format:
- audio/mpeg
- Copyright Status Statement:
- Copyright © College of Charleston Libraries.
- Access Statement:
- All rights reserved.
- Access Information:
- For more information contact Special Collections at Addlestone Library, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, 29424.
- Admin ID:
- 250557
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