A Black queer history of the United States

This illuminating account from gender studies scholars Snorton (Black on Both Sides) and Bost (Evidence of Being) showcases cultural moments and famous figures that have influenced the fight for Black and queer rights, and pinpoints ways in which "blackness, queerness, and transness indelibly shape America's national culture." The authors argue that Black gender and sexuality became tethered to deviance during slavery, causing a tension that continues to affect understandings of queerness in the Black community and America more broadly. During the Reconstruction and Jim Crow eras, Black leaders were asked or forced to hide their queerness, or else distance themselves from the civil rights movement. Queer Black activists found themselves excluded from fights for racial justice, as well as from the mainstream LGBTQ+ rights movement, where the focus on marriage equality failed to address more pressing concerns of people of color. But queerness, the authors argue, nonetheless found a unique foothold in the Black working class, where LGBTQ+ artists and drag performers emerged who would go on to shape the broader American entertainment landscape. Throughout, Snorton and Bost emphasize that Black queer and trans people persevered in "craft selves, communities, cultural expression, and political analyses that would appear to be impossible" given the obstacles. The result is an excellent window into a long-repressed past. (Jan.)

A historical appreciation of queer Black culture and how it shaped American history. Professors and gender studies authorities Snorton and Bost collaborate on this survey of the rich, vibrant, and overlooked queer Black culture in the U.S. across a century. Their book spotlights dramatic defining moments in queer Black history and the pioneers and radicals who spearheaded and shaped their own paths as American blackness was becoming redefined. The authors explore how gender and sexual stereotypes of Black people during American colonization "confined them to a condition of racial inferiority and sexual non-normativity." Reinforcing their arguments about the struggle of Black leaders to achieve visibility and viability during racial segregation and how coming out of the "racial closet" has resulted in greater marginalization, Snorton and Bost highlight queer Black activists and artists whose legacies precede them. Among them are filmmaker Marlon Riggs, author James Baldwin, dancer Josephine Baker, Harlem Renaissance poet Countee Cullen, New York City DJ Frankie Knuckles, and scholar-activist Angela Davis, whose sexuality informed her community visibility and artistic contributions. Also included is a profile of defiant and outspoken Black drag queen Joan Jett Blakk, whose two presidential campaigns attempted to transform mainstream American politics, alongside a wide range of Black queer and transgender artists and performers whose contributions to their artistic genres made indelible imprints on American society and the greater entertainment community at large. Expanding across transgender protests of the 1960s, the Stonewall rebellion, and the post--civil rights and Black Power eras into marriage equality and the Black Lives Matter movement, the book elaborates on how these efforts have left Black queer and transgender people "on the margins of the LGBTQ movement." Despite current waves of anti-queer and anti-transgender violence and historic (and current) efforts across generations to repress queer culture, the essential and underappreciated demographic of queer Black Americans perseveres and sustains. As interdisciplinary scholars, the authors believe that the honorable presentation of reminders and remembrances ensures a distinct and dynamic future for Black queer culture. An illuminating and innovative Black American queer history lesson. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.