Travels In A Gay Nation: Portraits of LGBTQ Americans
Travels In A Gay Nation: Portraits of LGBTQ Americans
on the LBGTQ road (Source:UWPress)
"We gays alone are the authorities on ourselves and our homosexuality, and others should listen to us." So says Frank Kameny the gay civil rights pioneer who marched in front of the White House in the ’60s.
Author Philip Gambone took Kameny’s advice andlistened to GLBTs for two years, traversing the US interviewing 200 people, 40 of whom are profiled inTravels in a Gay Nation. It is a look at where we’ve been, where we are, and where we need to go as a diverse national community.
Even though Gambone is an English professor at Boston University, his relaxed, unacademic prose style gets to the center of his subjects’ lives and their relations to the GLBT community. The interviews represent a socio- political cross section of GLBTQ life in 2010. Some stories are high profile and often told--Congressman Barney Frank and comedian Kate Clinton, for instance, and media superstars like humorist David Sedaris. Mostly, Gambone features lesser known artists, writers, academics, activists, and professionals making a difference in their chosen fields.
Some of the most interesting interviews are with activists like Christopher Barnhill, who was born HIV positive and is battling the rise of HIV/AIDS among young minority men as a coordinator of Metro TeenAIDS, or Carl Siciliano, who founded the Ali Forney Center in New York, where dozens of rejected queer youth are saved from ending up homeless, on drugs, working the streets.
Filmmaker Arthur Dong talks about growing up gay as an Asian American, dropping out of school, finding his own path as a filmmaker, and eventually making the groundbreaking documentary Coming Out Under Fire. Dean Spade, a transman, grew up a poor girl in the rural south cleaning houses with her mother. He went on to became the first professor to teach transgender law at Harvard. "I’m tired of journalists thinking that my breast reduction surgery was the defining moment of my life... it’s just one moment in my story." Dean uses the interview to talk about some entrenched inequalities in the national gay civil rights movement itself. Activist Urvashi Vaid echoes similar themes in her interview.
Opera singer Beth Clayton tells the author, "I have been given a gift to own my lesbianism and mylife through my art form." Writer Richard Rodriquez speaks to the importance of being distinct from the straight world: "I like the complications of it," he tell Gambone.
Travels is a keen reminder of how far we’ve come since Stonewall, and what we still need to do as gay Americans. Gambone devises a rich tapestry, without dogma, that celebrates the power of LGBTQ diversity.
Author Philip Gambone took Kameny’s advice andlistened to GLBTs for two years, traversing the US interviewing 200 people, 40 of whom are profiled inTravels in a Gay Nation. It is a look at where we’ve been, where we are, and where we need to go as a diverse national community.
Even though Gambone is an English professor at Boston University, his relaxed, unacademic prose style gets to the center of his subjects’ lives and their relations to the GLBT community. The interviews represent a socio- political cross section of GLBTQ life in 2010. Some stories are high profile and often told--Congressman Barney Frank and comedian Kate Clinton, for instance, and media superstars like humorist David Sedaris. Mostly, Gambone features lesser known artists, writers, academics, activists, and professionals making a difference in their chosen fields.
Some of the most interesting interviews are with activists like Christopher Barnhill, who was born HIV positive and is battling the rise of HIV/AIDS among young minority men as a coordinator of Metro TeenAIDS, or Carl Siciliano, who founded the Ali Forney Center in New York, where dozens of rejected queer youth are saved from ending up homeless, on drugs, working the streets.
Filmmaker Arthur Dong talks about growing up gay as an Asian American, dropping out of school, finding his own path as a filmmaker, and eventually making the groundbreaking documentary Coming Out Under Fire. Dean Spade, a transman, grew up a poor girl in the rural south cleaning houses with her mother. He went on to became the first professor to teach transgender law at Harvard. "I’m tired of journalists thinking that my breast reduction surgery was the defining moment of my life... it’s just one moment in my story." Dean uses the interview to talk about some entrenched inequalities in the national gay civil rights movement itself. Activist Urvashi Vaid echoes similar themes in her interview.
Opera singer Beth Clayton tells the author, "I have been given a gift to own my lesbianism and mylife through my art form." Writer Richard Rodriquez speaks to the importance of being distinct from the straight world: "I like the complications of it," he tell Gambone.
Travels is a keen reminder of how far we’ve come since Stonewall, and what we still need to do as gay Americans. Gambone devises a rich tapestry, without dogma, that celebrates the power of LGBTQ diversity.
by Philip Gambone
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