Where Do They Go? Race, Racism, and the History of the Black Gay Bar

Dr. Eric Gonzaba

Stevenson 101
9:30 AM

Dr. Gonzaba, a historian of African American and LGBT culture and an Assistant Professor of American Studies at California State University, Fullerton, explores how race helped define gay nightlife since the 1960s. He examines the birth and proliferation of separate queer spaces for people of color, especially African Americans, as a result of continued discrimination even in so called progressive gay circles. Black loyalties to bars that catered to black clientele represented a form of resistance to discriminatory clubs or bars that neglected black gay customers. Many African American gay men utilized and overcame this segregated nightlife scene to remake their gay lives on their own terms, away from white eyes and scrutiny. Dr. Gonzaba received his doctorate in American History from George Mason University in 2019. In 2014, he founded Wearing Gay History, an award-winning online digital archive and museum that explore global LGBT history through t-shirt. He’s currently completing a book on the culture and politics of gay nightlife in Washington, D.C., Baltimore, and Philadelphia since 1970.