Hidden in the Open
A Photographic Essay of Afro American Male Couples
from the Distant Past
Sometimes it is difficult not to write without anger. Pretending or
denying certain controversial truths do not exist for the purpose of
catering to a saccharine political correctness wanting to make the
individual comfortable is dishonest. Transfiguring a string of
independent words into coherent whole sentences not losing their
intended integrity but also not causing the reader to turn an
exasperated and eventually disinterested blind eye toward is
complicated.
How does one write about the Afro American gay male and couple? How
does one accomplish such a goal from an historical perspective?
Historically, the Afro American gay male and couple has largely been
defined by everyone but themselves. Afro American gay men are ignored
into nonexistence in parts of black culture and are basically second
class citizens in gay culture. The black church which has historically
played a fundamental role in protesting against civil injustices
toward its parishioners has been want to deny its gay members their
right to live a life free and open without prejudice. Despite public
projections of a "rainbow" community living together in harmonious co-
habitation, openly active and passive prejudices exist in the larger
gay community against gay Afro Americans.
Pockets within Afro American culture have on occasion wanted to deny
that its men could ever be gay and part of the overall African
American experience. Gay was traditionally conceived as a white man's
predicament, a sexual orientation and affliction common only to him.
By persistent influence to a culture not historically his own, the
disparate Afro American man became gay. The prurient interest in the
otherwise "straight" Afro American male by a white male effectively
turns the black male gay. Of course, this was all nonsense as Africa
has long history of homosexuality predating European incursion into
the continent. Open acceptance of the gay male varied from tribal
community to tribal community. The gay male often occupied an honored
high place in the African tribal community. In some instances, he
either publicly or privately took another male as a marital partner
without prejudice from his community. Where the predominant religious
influence was Islam, the construct of male affection depended on the
prejudices and custom within a specific local community where in some
instances a man had a wife for procreation and a socially quiet
husband; the male couple was expected to be discreet about their
relationship.
In the larger white dominated U.S. gay culture, the Afro American gay
male has and is often portrayed as a victim of black homophobia
needing the aide of a white gay savior. This is coupled with black
homophobia wanting to believe that two Afro American men cannot
"desire" and "love" one another. Thus, the defacto interracial gay
couple is ubiquitous in gay media. A misguided political correctness
has only accentuated this problematic image. The vast majority of
commercial photographic imagery within U.S. gay culture will portray
the Afro American gay male coupled with a white male. Where accounts
are written down for general reference to document gay history,
dominating is image of the white male couple and the interracial
couple. General gay culture has and is often hostile to the fact that
most Afro American gay men imbibe little and no sexual or emotional
interest in white men, but instead can prefer the Afro Diasporic
diversity among their own people. Taking cues from general gay
culture, even mainstream academic scholars and the media have adopted
the picture of the gay interracial couple. Gay pornography is the
primary medium where Afro American male couples are countenanced.
Special interest is reduced to the fetishistic centering on the black
phallus as black gay pornography is typically not produced for a Afro
American gay audience.
The selected images for this photo essay date from the mid 19th to the
20th century. Styles of photography included are cabinet cards,
picture post cards, tintypes and the more commonly used and
inexpensive photo paper such as Kodak dating to the WWII period and
afterwards. A picture mounted on a stiff card, the cabinet card was
the next generation of photographic imagery after the cartes de viste
which were the most popular from the mid 1850s and reached their peak
in popularity in the 1860s. Surpassing cartes de viste in popular use,
cabinet cards were influential from the 1870s to 1890s, declining in
use during the 1920s because of the growing popularity of picture post
cards. Picture post cards were cheaper and could be sent through the
mail using a penny stamp. Relatively inexpensive and quick to
produced, the tintype were photographs produced on sheets of thin
iron. The tintype was favored by photographers and the public from mid
19th century up until the 1930s.
Hopefully for this photo essay, they will challenge as false
definitions of the Afro American gay male and couple imposed from the
outside. Accomplishing such a task is certain to be herculean as from
time to time problems have arisen when the gay Afro American male was
want to define himself for himself outside the common stereotypes
imposed on him for reasons not excluding those for politics and
profit.
Some of these images are sure to be gay and others may not. The end
result is speculative at best for want in applying a label. Not every
gesture articulated between men was an indication of male to male
intimacies. Assuredly, what all photographs in this book have in
common are signs of Afro American male affection and love that were
recorded for posterity without fear and shame. Friendships where men
often wrote romantically to one another, walked arm in arm were not
uncommon to the straight and gay men alike during the 19th and early
20th centuries. Depending on economic situation, many even slept
together and this may have precluded or included physical intimacy
between the sheets.
Gay men did record their affections in photograph form after the
invention of the camera. Not as overt as many today will want to see,
tell tale signs of affection between lovers were as simple as a hand
on the shoulder, a visible clasp of the hands, limbs quietly touching
or simply two bodies in close proximity to one another ---- all
gestured affection carefully calculated so as not to arouse the
suspicions of a possible censorious photographer not inclined to have
an open mind.
Historically, during earlier eras of U.S. racial segregation, there
were Afro American communities thriving despite both codified and non-
codified prejudices being implemented as the law of the land. As
W.E.B. Dubois wrote in 1901, blacks lived in their own protected world
closed in from the outer world with churches, clubs, hotels, saloons
and charities along with their own social distinctions, amusements and
ambitions.
Within these microcosmic villages, which could be within large
cosmopolitan areas with the city and off the road rural areas, lived
subcultures of secure gay men. These men could be and were often
quietly tolerated by their local community. This contradicts popular
perception that for self preservation the Afro American gay male had
to run away and eventually divorce himself from his ethnic community.
Most research has concentrated on negative experiences within these
self-sustaining villages. Little has been written about those who
found contentment within these enclosed enclaves of the past before
the supposed panacea of integration into general white culture
destroyed the communal infrastructure. Even within early blues music,
there was often unapologetic and uncompromised acceptance of gay men
within the lyrics whether or not same lyrics were sung by an
heterosexual male or female.
Same gender loving men could be tolerated so long as their behavior
was not a threat to the precarious image of the larger Afro American
community wanting assimilation into larger U.S. culture. Overriding
importance for the community was a determination to present a positive
image outside prevalent racial caricatures conveying people of African
descent as lacking in industry and being intellectually unequipped to
compete. The private lives of these men could be ignored provided they
did not bring public scrutiny upon themselves by being anything but
discreet. Acceptance depended on healthy familial relationships which
if good allowed for the gay man to openly express himself and
participate fully in the larger family and community of friends and
neighbors. In those largely uneducated rural areas for instance, it
was common to refer to known gay men in a then street vernacular not
considered "politically correct" by today's standards. Words were not
used in a malice manner but only to identify the gay man. The gay man
was both accepted and treated as a "man" without receiving any kind of
special treatment and sympathy because of his same gender attractions.
This isn't to suggest that there existed a laissez faire attitude with
male same sex attraction. Remember, vocally homophobic pockets with
the larger Afro American community are want to deny the legitimate
existence, or influence, of Afro American gay men. Nor does it attempt
to ignore undue harassment for being perceived as gay in some black
communities. It does indicate that like in the general Afro American
experience, the gay black male experience was not monolithic and
should not perennially be viewed in the negative as typically done by
white gay historians who have been paternalistic and dare say
supremacist with their attempt at inclusiveness in documenting the gay
male of African descent.
Black gay men always found a way to meet one another. Without fail in
secret, they discovered some out of the way place to congregate and be
themselves, suspending all the rules of heterosexuality forced upon
their true inclinations. A rendezvous destination in a walk-up or
brownstone in Harlem, a nondescript house in the backwoods and just
off the road somewhere in the land locked Midwest or the sultry and
humid South , a section of the beach far removed from the occasional
de facto melanin designated spots, gay men of African descent came
together to socialize, find that "special one," or just not feel
alone.
They have meeting places today. The only difference is such spots
where we congregate are no longer hidden and off the road in the
majority of cases. More than provide a place for entertainment, a
stiff drink after work, or just meet friends or maybe a husband or
lover, our meeting places today provide a protective enclave for men
of African descent who have on occasional been made to feel either
unwelcome in the larger and whiter gay established hangouts, and, who
have had enough of certain "white admirers" wanting to go slumming for
an evening beneath bodies from the gay African Diaspora.
It is important for Afro American gay men, African Diasporic gay men
in general, to understand they have a history of loving and desiring
one another worth acknowledging and celebrating in whatever form. They
have an history of just being that is important. The photographs
presented here, and by extension a larger history of the Afro
American/ Afro Diasporic gay male, is only the initial step of a
defiant reclaiming of such facts representing the beginning tip in
research either by a professional scholar or the arm chair one willing
to put the time and labor in looking, asking questions, and wanting
answers.
Writing her book Portraits of a People: Picturing the African American
in the Nineteenth Century, scholar Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw wrote of
early African Americans encircled by a dominant society that
controlled their lives and image:
The important move from the margins of somebody else's portrait into
the center of one's own cannot be overstated....
Copyright 2010 by Trent Kelley
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