LGBTQ 101 FOR HBCUs [SUPPLEMENTAL SLIDES]

Black Womens Blueprint

279 Empire Blvd.
Brooklyn, NY.11225
347-533-9102/9103
info@blueprintny.org
www.blackwomensblueprint.org


Developed by:
Nicole Patin, HBCU Campus Coordinator
Farah Tanis, Executive Director
Black Womens Blueprint
ftanis@blueprintny.org



Things to Know: LGBTQ Roots
Homosexuality has existed among people of African Descent since
ancient times and on the African continent.

Same-sex marriages, homosexuality, gender non-conformity,
women marriages, have been recorded in somefortysocieties
in pre-colonization Africa. They were not a marginal phenomenon
(SOURCE: Tommy Boys, Lesbian Men, and Ancestral Wives: Female
Same-Sex Practices in Africa).

Among major West African ethnic and linguistic group in Benin, and
in southwest Nigeria, homosexual women who inherited wealth or
prospered economically established compounds of their own and at
the same time married women.
LGBTQ Black Facts
The inaugural results of a new Gallup question
-- posed to more than 120,000 U.S. adults thus
far -- shows that 3.4% of U.S. adults say "yes"
when asked if they identify as lesbian, gay,
bisexual, or transgender.

The survey results show that 4.6% of African-
Americans identify as LGBT, the highest
amongst any racial group.
LGBT Black History
1782: Deborah Sampson disguises herself as a
male and enlists in the Continental forces under
the name of Robert Shurtleff.

1880: Angelina Weld Grimke, (often confused
with her famous aunt, the white abolitionist
Angelina Grimke Weld), becomes a teacher and
a poet of the Harlem Renaissance.
LGBT Black History
1920: The Harlem Renaissance established the
reputation of such LGBTQ writers, artists, and
musicians as Gladys Bentley, Ma Rainey, Bessie
Smith, Countee Cullen, Claude McKay, Ethel
Waters, and Langston Hughes.

1953: James Baldwin publishes his first novel, Go
Tell It On the Mountain. During the 60s Baldwin is
a leading spokesman for the civil rights
movement.

LGBT Black History
1963: Bayard Rustin, a gay Black man, the
prime architect of the 1963 March on
Washington and aide to Martin Luther King,
Jr. from 1955 to 1960, helped organize the
Montgomery bus boycott in response to the
refusal of Rosa Parks to ride in the back of the
bus.
LGBT Black History
1976: Barbara Jordan, a Black Lesbian and a
congressional representative from 1972-1978,
delivers the keynote speech at the Democratic
National Convention. She is one of fourteen
people Jimmy Carter considers for Vice President.

1994: Deborah A. Batts, A Black Lesbian shattered
the glass ceiling within the federal governments
judicial branch when President Clinton appointed
her to the U.S. District Court in New York.


LGBT Black History
2003: The people of Palm Springs, Calif.,
elected the countrys first openly gay African-
American mayor in 2003. Ron Oden.

2008: Denise Simmons became the first out
lesbian African-American mayor of Cambridge,
Mass.the first to lead any American city, for
that matter.
LGBT Black History
2009: Georgias District 58 elected Simone
Bell, the countrys first African-American
lesbian to serve in a U.S. state legislature.
Prominent Black LGBTQ Leaders
Alice Walker: author, poet, and advocate
Alvin Ailey: choreographer and advocate
Angela Davis: political advocate, scholar, and
author
Bayard Rustin: chief organizer of the 1963
March on Washington, advisor to Martin
Luther King Jr. Bessie Smith: blues singer
Prominent Black LGBTQ Leaders
Countee Cullen: poet
E. Denise Simmons: mayor of Cambridge,
Massachusetts, during the 2008-2009 term,
first openly lesbian African American mayor in
the United States
E. Lyn Harris: author
James Baldwin: author
Jean-Michel Basquiat: artist
Prominent Black LGBTQ Leaders
Josephine Baker: dancer, singer, and actress
June Jordan: author
Langston Hughes: poet and social advocate
Ma Rainey: blues singer
Meshell Ndegeocello: singer
Sheryl Swoopes: WNBA player
Tracy Chapman: singerWade Davis, former NFL
player
Wanda Sykes: actress and comedian
Questions/More Information
Contact:
Farah Tanis, Executive Director
Black Womens Blueprint
ftanis@blueprintny.org