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Coalition of African Lesbians

South-African NPO

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 24, 2026
Entity authorityQ5137972
Source-derived summary

The Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL) was a network that comprised 30 non-profit organisations that are spread across 19 different countries in the sub-Saharan region of Africa. Their collective network is centred around feminism, activism, and pan-Africanism. The mission of CAL was to progress the freedom, liberation, and autonomy for all women who reside in Africa or in any other part of the world. Additionally, CAL strives to advocate and build the capacities of lesbian women while promoting African agency. The group disbanded in 2022.

History

The Coalition of African Lesbians was founded in 2003 at a meeting attended by a group of women, including Elizabeth Khaxas—a founder of Sister Namibia—from seven different African countries in Johannesburg, South Africa. It was originally under the name African Lesbian Alliance. In August 2004 in Windhoek, Namibia, the alliance met again with women from 14 different African countries in attendance, sponsored by The Rainbow Project and the Sister Namibia magazine. At this meeting, the organization's name changed to The Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL), and all of the participants were very strategic and adamant about advancing lesbian rights and placing power back into a women's ability to make choices for themselves, especially in regard to their sexual freedom. They were also focused on disseminating HIV information that would resonate and help keep lesbian, bisexual, and transgender women communities safe as they were often overlooked by prominent HIV/AID organizations.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Coalition of African Lesbians” is south-African NPO. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Coalition, African and Lesbians, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2022, 2003, 2004—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 2003-01-01. For this dossier, Coalition, African and Lesbians is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “south-African NPO” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 24, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5137972. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2022, 2003 and 2004.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Coalition of African Lesbians”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Coalition of African Lesbians primary sources, Coalition of African Lesbians archive and Coalition research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Coalition of African Lesbians”?
  2. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
  3. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Coalition of African Lesbians” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.