Radio 4

Historian and leather and kink activist Vi Johnson likes to be called Mama Vi. At 75, within her community, she’s become a fiercely protective figure, looking after not only the people who make it what it is, but also its culture and history. As a leader of a community that has long existed at the margins, she has witnessed many attempts to erase its history; some obvious, others far more insidious. Driven by ignorance, by hate, or even by the impulse to hide parts of themselves.

For our 100th episode of Sideways, Matthew Syed asks how a community survives when the evidence of its existence is threatened? From book burnings to records quietly discarded, the past is shaped not only by what we choose to remember, but by what we allow to disappear.

With activist Vi Johnson; Richard Ovenden, Director of the Bodleian Libraries at the University of Oxford and author of Burning the Books: A History of Knowledge Under Attack. And sexologist Toni Solenne.

Presenter: Matthew Syed

Producer: Julien Manuguerra-Patten

Editor: Katherine Godfrey

Production Manager: Joe Savage

Sound Design and Engineering: Daniel Kempson

Theme tune by Ioana Selaru

A Novel production for BBC Radio 4