Shades of Love: Black Homosexuality Volume 1
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DVD details
DVD: Region Code 0Format: NTSC
DVD Release Date: 2007-12-27
Studio: Ijaba Films
DVD Reviews of Shades of Love: Black Homosexuality Volume 1
DVD Review: Talking Heads
Summary: 4 Stars
It's a sad fact of life that the twin evils of racism and homophobia are still very much around and thriving. It's also a sad fact of life, in my view, that these forms of bigotry render many of us invisible and our voices unheard. As black homosexuals - men and women - we very often find themselves and the issues we face largely ignored. Being both black and gay - often described as the "double-whammy" - often separates us from the wider society we inhabit. The same racism the black general population experiences on a daily basis is almost magnified in the LGBT community against black LGBT people. At the same time, homophobia within the black community pushes black LGBT people to the margins of their communities, pushing them into making choices that are not always to their benefit or, as it happens, to the benefit of the very communities that judge, question, harass and oppress them.
Produced and directed by Tressa Sanders and lasting just 52mins and 53secs, this is the first volume in a trilogy of documentaries that attempts to take a closer look at black homosexuality. It's in three parts: "Homosexuality in pre-colonial Africa", "Racism in the gay community" and "In Closing". The documentary is stark, no-frills and low budget. It's also very crudely edited but that doesn't take anything away from the power of the talking heads telling their stories.
The documentary starts by looking at pre-colonial and present day Africa; challenging the popular fallacy that homosexuality is something that the white man brought to the continent. The eleven participants - men, women, scholars, intellectuals and community workers - are all well versed on the issue, especially as they pertain to Africa. Some had actually met with indigenous Africans. Some had travelled to Ghana and one had actually lived in there but I feel this first part of the documentary would've been a lot more powerful if it had included participation from Africans themselves, even if it was Africans who have emigrated to the US and are now residents or citizens.
But then maybe the documentary maker asked but no one was prepared to speak on camera. There was one participant of Caribbean origin, thankfully.
The participants seemed to me to have a very romanticised, rose-tinted view of what homophobia in Africa is like though (which is why it would've been invaluable to have input from some gay people from Africa, even if they didn't want to appear on camera) and I was reminded of the fact that people who visit a place do not necessarily experience it in the same way as people who actually live there.
Some of the issues explored include the theory that homosexuality has always existed in Africa but that it's just not as institutionalised as it is in the US (and in the west as a whole); that it was the white man and Christianity that introduced the notion of homophobia and anti-gay legislation to Africa; that in Africa, community is given priority over the individual whereas in the US, the individual is more important than the community.
The whole idea of labels and the preference for the term "single gender loving" over "gay" or "lesbian" is also talked about.
The documentary goes on in the second part, to look at racism in the gay community and looks at, for instance, the "great myth" and objectification of black men by their white counterparts, the difficulties often encountered when black and white men try to work together towards achieving a certain goal (race always gets in the way, we're told), power structures within interracial relationships and how power and money interact with race.
There's a lot more to this piece but it would be impossible - not to mention counterproductive - to go into all of it here. I got a definite feeling of affirmation from watching the documentary but I didn't feel I learned much from it - apart from the shocking realisation that some of the very issues black gay men here in Leeds are grappling with as I write this, are being grappled with by their counterparts in places like Albany and Washington, D.C. I used to think the US was streets ahead of us in certain respects but now I'm not so sure. A colleague and I are actually writing an article on this very subject for a national magazine and it doesn't make comfortable reading, even from our point of view.
Whether said publication will actually have the stones to go ahead and publish the article without taking an editorial scalpel to its soul though - or indeed, go ahead and publish it at all - still remains to be seen.
But I digress. I definitely found it interesting to watch and I definitely feel it would be an excellent accompanying educational tool if I were facilitating any discussions or presenting any workshops in the future, on the issues faced by black gay men and lesbians, especially in a white dominated society. A surprisingly large number of people still have no idea. I look forward to ordering and watching Volumes 2 and 3.
More Shades of Love: Black Homosexuality Volume 1 reviews:
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