ACT UP Oral History Project Marks 25 Years of Documenting AIDS Activism in New York

On September 15, 2026, members of the AIDS direct-action group ACT UP, researchers, and queer historians gathered at the CUNY Graduate Center in Manhattan to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the ACT UP Oral History Project. The initiative was established a quarter-century ago to preserve uncensored firsthand accounts from participants in the fight against the HIV/AIDS epidemic during the late 1980s and 1990s.

According to Gay City News , the project was founded in 2001 by author and historian Sarah Schulman alongside filmmaker Jim Hubbard. At the turn of the millennium, they recognized that the history of grassroots AIDS activism risked being forgotten or distorted amid the rise of the digital era and the scarcity of digitized archives. Over 18 years of continuous work in collaboration with videographer James Wentzy, the team conducted 187 comprehensive video interviews with surviving members of ACT UP New York. All recordings and complete transcripts were published online for free public access at actuporalhistory.org.

During the commemorative event, moderated by CLAGS: Center for LGBTQ Studies Executive Director Matt Brim, Schulman highlighted the global reach of the open archive, noting that the website has generated over 14 million views and more than 700,000 transcript downloads worldwide. The recorded testimonies provided the historical foundation for Hubbard’s award-winning documentary United in Anger: A History of ACT UP (2012) and Schulman’s seminal volume Let the Record Show: A Political History of ACT UP New York, 1987–1993 (2021). Attendees also revisited archival footage of major direct actions, including the 1989 “Stop the Church” protest at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and demonstrations targeting federal regulatory bodies.

ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) was founded in New York in March 1987 in response to government inaction and societal indifference during the height of the HIV crisis. Utilizing nonviolent civil disobedience, street blockades, and scientific advocacy targeting agencies like the FDA and NIH, the organization successfully accelerated clinical drug trials, reshaped medical definitions, and increased public accountability for healthcare access.

Uránia previously covered the release of David Levithan and Gabriel Duckels’ book “The Fight of Our Lives: AIDS in America” , exploring the history of the HIV epidemic in the United States and the community’s fight against institutional neglect.