thank you for your service, I second all the praises afforded to you by people who appreciate what you've done. I wanted to ask if you knew of contemporary Congolese thinkers who are of a specifically leftist orientation. As well as any thinkers/works/art discussing LGBTi Congolese peoples.
I’ve posted articles and books from Congolese writers, scroll through the blog to find them, but I guess V. Y. Mudimbe is the most famous one.
Thomas Hendriks (2019) Queer(ing) popular culture: homo-eroticprovocations from Kinshasa, Journal of African Cultural Studies
Contemporary African societies are regularly depicted as inherently homophobic cultural spaces by Western media. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork among self-consciously effeminate fioto men and their so-called ‘normal’ boyfriends in Kinshasa (DRC), this article troubles such monolithic images of ‘African homophobia’. My interlocutors’ deliberately provocative readings of music, video clips, urban painting and street performances bring to the fore surprisingly queer complicities within popular culture. Rather than dis-covering a ‘gay’ subculture hiding in the shadows of the city, this article reveals the possibilities for sexual eccentricity at the surface of urban life and demonstrates how, despite its often moralistic and sometimes violent messages, popular culture is itself always already queer. Moreover, pointing at the usually overlooked homoerotic affordances of urban ambiance as a social field for the accumulation of ‘transgressive capital’, my fioto interlocutors celebrate the proliferation of queer desires in spite of – and, perhaps, because of – everyday performances of homophobia.
Hendriks, Thomas. “Queer Complicity in the Belgian Congo: Autobiography and Racial Fetishism in Jef Geeraerts’s (Post)Colonial Novels.” Research in African Literatures
In this essay, I present a “queer” reading of the (post)colonial novels by Jef Geeraerts, a Flemish author infamous for his explicit depictions of sex and violence in the Belgian Congo. I demonstrate how both his racism and misogyny feed on a homoerotic dynamic that appears to destabilize hegemonic colonial discourse, but is actually mobilized as a literary strategy to forge a new kind of white masculinity in the “heart of darkness.” Despite Geeraerts’s conscious anti-establishment modernism, this underlying and often overlooked homoerotics in ostensibly “heterosexual” novels is shown to be an accomplice of colonial power, silencing the black other and reaffirming a porno-tropic tradition of racial fetishism
Eustache, Kilwa Sibumba, Banza Bamwamba Adolphe, and Ndabereye Pendeza Hortense. 2018. Les perspectives de l'institutionnalisation de l'homosexualité en afrique : Cas de la république démocratique du congo. International Journal of Innovation and Applied Studies
Alors qu’il est légalisé sous d’autres cieux, le mariage homosexuel demeure mal perçu en Afrique. A l’exception del’Afrique du Sud qui a fait des progrès énormes en matière des droits des homosexuels, les autres Etats africains s’opposentencore au mariage homosexuel et les personnes qui pratiquent l’homosexualité sont rejetées et stigmatisées. Dans ce contexteoù le sentiment homophobe est largement répandu et face à la pression des puissances occidentales qui exigent que les droitsde l’homme, y compris ceux des homosexuels soient respectés, s’interroger sur les perspectives de l’institutionnalisation del’homosexualité en Afrique devient intéressant. D’où cet article intitulé « Les perspectives de l’institutionnalisation del’homosexualité en Afrique. Cas de la République Démocratique du Congo ». A la suite de notre participation-observation etdu dépouillement des résultats de nos recherches menées dans la ville de Lubumbashi en République Démocratique du Congo,nous avons remarqué que l’homosexualité est encore mal perçue en République Démocratique du Congo et de manièregénérale en Afrique. Les congolais tentent encore pour le moment de s’accrocher à leurs valeurs morales et culturelles quirejettent l’homosexualité. A ces jours, il serait malvenu et incongru d’initier une loi institutionnalisant le mariage homosexuel.Toutefois, les dirigeants politiques congolais et africains de manière générale, ne s’hasarderaient pas à prendre une loipénalisant les homosexuels de peur d’être accusés par les puissances occidentales de soutenir les violations des droits humains,ce qui va entrainer les sanctions.
Evans-Pritchard, E. E. “Sexual Inversion among the Azande.” American Anthropologist
Male and female homosexual relationship seems to have been common among the Azande in past times. Between males it was approved of in the bachelor military companies. Between females it is said to have been a frequent, though highly disapproved of, practice in polygamous homes.
Landscape Analysis of the Human Rights Situation of Lesbians, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersex People and Sex Workers in the Democratic Republic of Congo
Patou Izai is an LGBTI activist in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). In 2011, Patou told his family that he was gay. It was difficult for him to do, and caused difficulties in his relationship with his family. He knew so many young people in DRC who had similar struggles, and who wanted to help. This led him to establish Jeunialissime, a LGBTI advocacy group in DRC. Patou and his group members use the power of radio to get LGBTI youth in DRC speaking about their lives and their concerns, and to chip away at stigma and discrimination in society at large.
This is a good article by Congolese photographer and reporter Esther Nsapu
Members of the LGBT Community in DRC Face Violence and Excommunication
Scaly Kep’na Izei. Un combat gay au Congo and La clandestinité pour vivre son homosexualité à Lubumbashi are also a good article to read
Organisations to check out
Mouvement pour la Promotion de du Respect et Egalité des Droits Sexuel en RDC
Rainbow Sunrise Mapambazuko
