Professor Hopes to Reduce Stigma Among LGBT Women of Color

Known for her sociological studies of family formation and same-sex practice within certain racial and ethnic groups, UCLA Professor Mignon Moore visited Berkeley's Ed Roberts Campus to facilitate a discussion about LGBT parents of color, with an emphasis on African American same-sex female-headed households.

Her recently published book, Invisible Families: Gay Identities, Relationships and Motherhood Among Black Women , served as the basis for the October 19 conversation, which was hosted by Our Family Coalition, UC Berkeley Law, and City College of San Francisco's LGBT Department.

"It's important to talk about the way that race influences the way black women think about their sexuality," Moore told the Bay Area Reporter, "the different routes they take to motherhood, and the relationships they have with their families."

Reducing the level of stigma around sexuality for people who identify as LGBT is one of Moore's main objectives in writing and talking about her work. The more conversations that occur around the multifaceted experiences of LGBT people, Moore said, the less shame people take on and the more normal they feel.

Over 50 people attended the event and many shared their experiences around heading same-sex households, being women of color, being in interracial relationships, having children, and navigating the world in ways that heterosexual and even white middle class same-sex couples take for granted. Addressing the intersections of race, sexuality, class and gender were priorities for Moore and the audience alike.

"The more they talk about families and experiences," Moore said, "the more courage and confidence they get. They feel a part of something bigger than their own experience."

Many attendees expressed frustration grounded in their experiences as same-sex parents - even in the Bay Area. Some had experienced or witnessed discrimination on account of having same-sex headed families and spoke of their children having to explain it at school as well.

"You have to constantly make the decision about who you come out to as family," said one parent with a 13-year-old son. "It's an everyday explanation. There's no way to just slide in. It's never simple."

Paramount to the discussion was shedding light on the way African American women negotiate same-sex desire, find partners, and create families. For her book, Moore conducted interviews and surveys from 100 African American women in New York and focused particularly on women that came of age during the 1960s and 1970s and finding out how they shaped their lives within spaces that sometimes rejected their sexual orientation or denied them certain privileges based on race or class.

"There are many different types of experiences around social class, education and how we come to have children in our families," Moore said. "I hope to show how these families function, how they run their home, the conflicts they have, their strengths, support networks, things that need improvement and how do we help strengthen the family."

Also in her book, Moore talked about the various ways women gender themselves within the African American community, how they connect with each other based on those presentations, gendered roles between women in same-sex relationships, how those couples chose to bring children into relationships and how religious life is negotiated within the community.

Judy Appel, executive director of Our Family Coalition, spoke on behalf of the host organizations in expressing her excitement for Moore's visit to the Bay Area. Our Family Coalition works to make all families visible, Appeal told the Bay Area Reporter, and the event highlighted the need to recognize that LGBTQ families are of every race, ethnicity and class.

"This is the first time since I've been doing this work that I've seen a book that talks about the intersections between queer families and queer families of color," Appel said. "We feel really fortunate to host an event that's holding that up."

Moore echoed the importance of spotlighting certain demographics that have been lost amidst the larger LGBT movement and expressed feeling honored to facilitate a community discussion that addressed that.

"It's critical for people fighting for our rights to understand the myriad issues that exist for our populations, to fully understand who we're talking about," she said. "A component that's been missing is our black, Latino and Asian Pacific Islander families. To best serve LGBT communities, we need a fuller portrait of who's in those communities."

Moore is an associate professor of sociology and vice chair and director of graduate studies in African American studies at UCLA and a board member of the Council on Contemporary Families.