Africa and LGBT Citizens: An Uphill Battle

The challenges of LGBT citizens in several African nations have been broadcast all over the news lately. The most prominent story, the Ugandan bill proposing the death penalty for homosexuality has engendered an increasingly chilling atmosphere of hate and fear in that country. (BBC news video part 1, part 2). In Malawi a gay couple was arrested for holding a marriage ceremony and Another Malawi man was arrested for putting up gay rights posters. In both Uganda and Malawi campaigns against LGBTs have escalated and taken to the streets. Some of this activity has spread to Nigeria where a group of gay men face death by stoning for wearing women's clothes. In Kenya as well a protest erupted when a same-sex ceremony was scheduled to take place. In Rwanda the Parliament has put off a scheduled vote to criminalize homosexuality until later this year. All and all, it seems clear that although the African National Congress of South Africa has legalized same-sex marriage and offers full civil rights to LGBT folks, Central Africa is definitely a very difficult place to be queer.

The brighter spot in this struggle is that the reason for the increased mobilization of the forces of hate and fear, is the greater visibility and activism of LGBT's around the globe has spread to Africa. In this technological world, news of other countries cannot be suppressed. Even now in Uganda, lesbians and gays are demonstrating, speaking out and risking their lives for this fight. In Kenya The Gay and Lesbian Coalition of Kenya, is alive and active although the former web site called "Gay Uganda," that geocities had described as "dedicated to all those in the world who have discovered that to be gay is to be human: and to those in Uganda who walk under the cloud of their society's prejudice" has been replaced with the message: "Sorry, the Geocities site you were trying to reach is no longer available.

In Africa the interrelationship between imperialism, colonialism, religion and homosexuality has been long, complex and fraught with conflict. There are no easy answers but those interested in learning more about this aspect of Africa can peruse books that shed more light on both the conditions of LGBT life in Africa as well as the history from which they arise: "Heterosexual Africa? The History of an Idea from the Age of Exploration to the Age of AIDS" by March Epprecht. "African Intimacies: Race, Homosexuality and Globalization" by Neville Hoad and for more information on the specific condition of women and lesbians, "Tommy Boys, Lesbian Men and Ancestral Wives: Female same-sex practices in Africa" by Ruth Morgan and Saskia Wieringa.

Still Defying Silence: Audre Lorde

Audre Lorde was a poet of stunning eloquence, a political activist, a theorist and a chronicler of the times she lived in. Growing up in Harlem as a self-identified black, lesbian-feminist she was unwilling to suppress any aspect of her identity for the sake of expediency or acceptance. Her quotation, "Your silence cannot protect you!" became a mantra of sorts for the lesbian community. Her 1982 biography, "Zami: a New Spelling of My Name," captivated many who had never read a word about being butch, black and lesbian on the gritty streets of 1950's New York.

The essays in this book, "I am Your Sister: Collected and Unpublished Writings of Audre Lorde," are as powerful and relevant today as they were when she wrote them. Although she speaks to everyone, her writing here is directed primarily toward the straight, black, feminist community, to shake out the fear and prejudice that stands as a barrier to achieving a politically powerful base "family" from which to take on oppression. In this respect the title becomes a plea for unity in that struggle.

Audre Lorde died in 1992 at age 58 after a battle with metastatic breast cancer. Here is some video footage from that last year. Her final memoir, "The Cancer Journals," documented her experience with fatal illness, and was just another example of her refusal to succumb to silence.

Archives February 2010

Gary Fisher Papers : “Proceed at your own risk”

I love the first page of Gary’s diary “Vol. V.” It’s an invitation that sets the tone with a wink and a smile. And it sums up all of the contradictions that surround the work of a diarist. Are these private musings for public consumption? A means to think through one’s life? An explanation? Who is the audience? Does it affect what’s written? And, if it does, how? I can offer no answers but it is a question I revisit each time I read a diary.



Gary Fisher was a gay African American man who enjoyed writing, drawing and, if the diaries are to be believed, dancing! He was a dedicated diarist. Born on June 19, 1961 in Bristol, Pennsylvania, Fisher attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from 1979-1983 where he studied English and creative writing. He died of AIDS at the age of 32 on February 22, 1994. After his death, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick edited portions of his journals, poems and stories in order to publish Gary in Your Pocket. Gary’s thoughts on life and love seemed very fitting for a February post.



The Hormel Center’s archival collections include diaries from a few different individuals. The Vincent Diaries, the Gary Fisher Papers, and the Louis Graydon Sullivan Papers contain the most diaries. The Sullivan Papers are on deposit from the GLBT Historical Society of Northern California and document the life and work of a female-to-male transsexual before, during and after his gender reassignment. All Hormel Center archives are handled through the San Francisco History Center, 6th Floor, Main Library.

Proposition 8 On Trial

The testimony has concluded (click here for a video wrap up), but amicus briefs are still being filed in the Perry v. Schwarzenegger, constitutionality of same-sex marriage, case that took place in the Federal Courthouse in San Francisco. Attorneys David Boies and Ted Olson a Democrat and a Republican who repesented opposite sides in the Bush v. Gore election aftermath are the odd couple who have presented the case to Judge Vaughn Walker.

Kudos to those who, in spite of a court order banning filming the proceedings, have kept us informed of the action, blow by blow.

The Courage Campaign has a site: prop8trialtracker.com that already has an interesting lawsuit under it's belt. They used is a slightly altered version of the original yes on prop 8 logo with one of the characters changed from male to female. In other words, they made the family headed by a lesbian couple. They won their lawsuit based on the grounds that parody and satire are legal!

Firedoglake has done a great job live-blogging the entire trial so here's a shout-out to them and their flying fingers!

But the coup de grace on the camera issue came when Los Angeles film makers John Ireland and John Ainsworth decided to take the transcript and film a complete reenactment of the proceedings using volunteers from the Screen Actors Guild. It can be viewed, with actors bios and all kinds of background information at their web site: http://www.marriagetrial.com/ and for the youtube version with a larger screeen size click here.

Thanks to these folks and many others who have given us full access to this ground-breaking trial!

Changing Portrayals in the Mainstream Media

As much as book lovers might hate to admit it, the primary way mainstream ideology is promoted and disseminated is not through the written word but through the visual media. In his book, "from perverts to fab five: The Media's Changing Depiction of Gay Men and Lesbians," Rodger Streitmatter charts the changing topography of the LGBT cultural landscape reflected through the lens of television and movies. He begins with the newspaper image of the prowling pervert of the Joseph McCarthy era and proceeds through the breakthrough film "Brokeback Mountain" in 2005. Ellen DeGeneres' coming out, "Queer as Folk," The L-Word," Will and Grace," and "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy," all of which have become cultural reference points in television history, are taken on by Streitmatter, a Professor and Senior Associate Dean in the School of Communication at American University in Washington, D.C.

For other resources the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, (GLAAD), monitors the U.S. media for both positive and negative depictions of queer folks. Here is a video of the history of LGBTs on television. And here is a more up to date version of the same subject.

Judy Grahn: Words That Mobilized a Movement

Judy Grahn's poetry is intense, electric, a firestorm that illuminated a path for dyke activists in the early seventies. She spoke, she theorized, she shed light from a feminist and uniquely lesbian perspective that was steeped in her working-class roots and consciousness. And as the years have passed she continues to explore and analyze the meaning of patriarchy and the role that women play in it.

"The Judy Grahn Reader," is a compilation that summarizes the highlights of her work from 1969 to 2000. It begins with the "Common Woman Poems," and continues through much of her early poetry including "Edward the Dyke," and her classic epic poem, "A Woman is Talking to Death." There are short sections of fiction and drama and many excerpts from her prolific later-life, mostly non-fiction material.

Here are some selections from interviews with Grahn and an article on Celebrating the Poetry of the Women's Movement.

Bayard Rustin, Gay Civil Rights Activist

Martin Luther King Day celebrates the birthday of the most well-known leader of the black civil rights movement. However, a long unsung hero and prominent activst of that era had been nearly written out of history up until the last decades of the 20th century. Bayard Rustin, the organizer of the 1963 March on Washington was an openly gay African-American man, a draft resister, a pacifist and a one-time member of the Communist Party. He faced arrest for his political convictions and his sexual orientation and endured censure from both the outside world as well as the groups he considered his community.

Bayard Rustin: American Dreamer is an overview of his life and times. Jerald Podair begins with a chronology of important events in his career and the book is organized by time periods with a chapter at the end containing supporting articles, letters and statements by Rustin addressing a wide-range of political issues from trade-unions to Soviet Jewry to Homosexual Rights. This book is a handy resource with a host of original material and documentation.

Lost Prophet: The Life and Times of Bayard Rustin, by John D'Emilio is a more in depth biography. "Based on more than a decade of archival research and interviews," it is revommended for those who want to dive more fully into the details of the turbulent life of this passionate and fascinating man.

Here is a film clip with actual footage from the civil rights struggle that includes John D'Emilio speaking and also a clip of Rustin debating Malcolm X.

The Queer Perspective in Spanish Culture

Mexico City recently legalized same-sex marriage and adoption. Buenos Aires just licensed its first gay marriages as well. But the pioneering country of the Spanish-speaking world is Spain, a country that legalized queer marriages in 2005. The death of dictator Francisco Franco in 1975 brought Spain out from behind a heavy, fascist curtain of repression and isolation where even the train tracks had been built to different dimensions than those in the rest of Europe.

Franco's death brought forth a culture renaissance known as La Movida Madrilena, (the Madrid Movement), a politically and socially progressive blossoming of art and culture that continues today. This book, "Queer Transitions in Contemporary Spanish Culture: From Franco to La Movida," sheds light on ongoing democratic transition of Spain from a queer perspective. Gema Perez-Sanchez begins with the dangerous and self-loathing homosexual of the Franco years, through the literary blossoming of the eighties onward through the early years of the 21st century. She analyzes films, periodicals and comic books along with works of literary fiction.

Here is some more information on La Movida. And click here for the moving speech by the Spanish Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, delivered in 2005 marking the end of discriminatory marriage laws.