A lot of my work happens within my Black gay community - that's something I'm extremely proud of. It's a blessing to be able to choose this in this uncertain economy. It's an extension of how I feel about developing and maintaining our community - our spaces and relationships with others like myself. Lately, though, I've been wondering about how this translates on the level of diaspora.
I know very little about Black gay life in the UK. Paul Boakye sent me In The Family about a year ago - it's a collection of faces and places central to the England's Black gay community, and I learned a lot from that! I also had the pleasure of meeting internationally acclaimed photographer Ajamu X when I visited London earlier this year. I'll definitely have to go back to get a better sense of our scene over there.
I know even less about Black gay people in Africa, or anywhere else we are in the world. And I'm so tired of running into Afrikaaner blogs! You would think that Black people in Africa (doesn't that sound redundant?) don't blog! (I'm sure there's a deeper Digital Divide-related conversation here.) So that's what I'm in search of, global connections for a more global perspective of Black gay identity and culture. Here are some links that I've found:
“In Roots of Homophobia, on BBC Radio 4 this week, Rikki Beadle-Blair travels to Jamaica where homosexuality remains a crime punishable by ten years hard labour and homophobic murders go largely unpunished.”
Rikki's Metrosexuality | Rikki's In The Family bio
‘True Confessions: A Discourse on Images of Black Male Sexuality’, by Isaac Julien and Kobena Mercer
Huriyah Magazine: for LBGT Muslims
‘One Face of Gay Africa’ Part 1 | Part 2
‘Joao Desales: A Black Brazillian in San Francisco’
And K. Anthony Appiah is dead wrong when he suggests that gayness is what's 'being spread across the globe' - and not queerness. 'Queerness' is that rainbow-flag waving, gym body fascist, leatherman/drag queen-for-a-day marching bullshit that white people need to claim the identity of outsider while simultaneously keeping their white privilege intact. Gayness (read: homosexuality) is what already exists globally.
You might also look up the writings of Black gay Toronto resident Orville Lloyd Douglas who comments on the Black LGBT community in Canada.
Keep us informed of your findings. Cause I’ll be damend if I know.
Also, I’m not sure I agree gayness exists globally, either (which may account for the paucity of information). How are you defining “gayness”?
By ‘gayness’ I mean homosexuality, and that exists everywhere. But although diverse sexualities exist everywhere, sexual diversity doesn’t always create or necessitate its own subculture.
“Gayness” and “queerness”…now, that’s interesting…you know, I’ve never really took the time to rationalize the difference between those two terms.
I don’t know why it’s so difficult to find gays in Africa who “blog” I was born in Nigeria, and I’ve met quite a few African-born gays on the net. The problem is, they’re all elsewhere. I have a couple of Nigerian friends in London who have online journals, a few in Australia, and several here in the US…I have met a woman online who is currently in Nigeria right now, but she’s going through some financial troubles right now, therefore she doesn’t e-mail that frequently. Also, her sexuality remains a mystery to me. I know for a fact that she’s attracted to women, but she doesn’t really seem to identify as either lesbian or bisexual.
“I know for a fact that she’s attracted to women, but she doesn’t really seem to identify as either lesbian or bisexual.”
I think Toni is onto something with that. It seems in most countries, outside of US, either you are identified as someone who has same-gender sex or you’re not - even if you do actually have same-gender sex. America seems to be the only country that openly identifies permutations like the current “DL” fascination. Perhaps, that is what makes this Black, gay Diaspora, elusive. As much as we criticize our country, we enjoy (and take for granted) freedoms of expression that our global brothers and sisters do not.
Also Donald, I disagree with “gayness” as a term synonymous with “homosexual”. Homosexual is an academic term, chiefly describing same-gender sexuality. Gay - in my book - describes an attitude - internal and external - toward that homosexuality. Those who reject their (own) homosexuality do not identify as “gay” and therefore do not develop or participate in a gay “culture”. It could be argued that in their universal denial of the term gay they create a gay-counter culture or Subculture. But, even then, I don’t think that dynamic represents a “global connections for a more global perspective of Black gay identity and culture” that you - we - seek.
I think there’s a difference between what we interpret as gayness. When I use the word ‘gay’ I use it specifically to connotate a certain degree of same-sex attraction - what she is (attracted to women) rather than how she identifies herself (as neither lesbian or bisexual - which she still might be, even though she doesn’t identify that way).
And I think that’s the way Mr. Appiah was using it, the very same juxtaposition of identity versus existence. Except that he was wrong - people exist first and identify themselves later. I think people who don’t choose to identify themselves by certain terms (gay, lesbian, queer, etc.) do so not because of who they are (someone with same-sex attraction) but because of the need to distance themselves from the stigma and the details of an identity that they can’t relate to.
For instance, I can identify with the term ‘gay’ because I’m able to subtract the default whiteness out of that identity. Many people can’t - and white people don’t and won’t. What frightens me is that this rainbow flag is becoming this global icon of universal homosexuality - when it is NOT universal. It is exceedingly lily-white regardless of where it touches down …
fuwata nyuki, ule
asali,
is a swahili proverb
when loosely translated
follow the bees, you
may get some honey.
you ask questions that
i too have asked.
where is everyone else?
as a queer identifying,
afro - diasporic woman,
the need to identify
myself in part as a
member of a community
is as innate as it is a
socially constructed
paradigm. i have
recently relocated to
the united states from
kenya. and the sense
of isolation is greater
here than it were back
home. identity hinged
on citizenship than
that of gender polemics.
when the need to survive
superseeds anything else
the possibility of
networking, sharing
ideas is pushed to a
a lower consideration.
speaking with fellow
compatriots who have
lived in the us for a
longer time than i have.
i get the impression of
‘otherness’ esp. within
the afri.american
lesbigay communities.
this is not counting the
other isms that many of
us experience.
as a collective,
the life of an
immigrant
whether as a
political
or economic
refugee is hinged on
a complexity of
identities thrushed
in the need for
survival beyond anything
else.
we become
cautious.
less inviting.
i identify myself as
queer because to me, it
allows for fludity as
opposed to gay. which
in my opinion is as
rigid as it is
constricting.
eurocentricness
in identifying
indigenous ways
of knowing.
we could go on
to speak of the
deconstruction of
language as a tool
for identity.
ama kitu kama hiyo.
orsomethinglikehthat.
Gays: Guardians of the Gates
thank you.
Quite interesting post and comments.
For the most part, I use “gay.” I don’t have a problem with using “queer,” but rarely use it because it feels foreign.
I’m hoping you’ll share all info that this post generates.
Well… where are all the men? I am in West Africa, in fact in Conakry, Guinea! I cant find no gays around here! I didnt know it was so difficult!