Day 5: Queer Kinship in African Traditions.
Before colonization, many African societies recognized and honored diverse sexualities and genders as integral to community life. These identities were not seen as separate from culture but were woven into kinship, spirituality, and governance. Among the Igbo of Nigeria, women-women marriages secured lineage and property rights, ensuring continuity of family and land. In Yoruba traditions, gender-nonconforming people held spiritual and ritual authority, often serving as priests, diviners, and healers. In Buganda (present-day Uganda), historical accounts record same-sex relationships within royal courts, particularly among kings and their male pages. Anthropological and oral histories across the continent show that queerness was not only present but embedded in cultural systems for centuries.
Facing Erasure
The arrival of European colonizers disrupted these long-standing traditions. Through imported laws and Christian doctrines, colonizers criminalized same-sex relationships and erased gender diversity. What had once been respected cultural practices were condemned as sinful or “unnatural.” Many of the anti-LGBTQ+ laws still enforced in African nations today are direct inheritances from British, French, and Portuguese colonial administrations. These laws are wrongly framed as “traditional” when in truth they represent colonial impositions.
Survival
Despite this violence and erasure, African queer communities continue to resist and reclaim ancestral history. Writers, artists, and activists have been amplifying precolonial traditions to challenge the narrative that queerness is foreign. Through oral storytelling, scholarship, visual art, and digital activism, they are affirming that African queerness is not imported but deeply rooted in cultural memory. From contemporary movements in South Africa and Kenya to grassroots advocacy in Uganda and Nigeria, LGBTQ+ Africans are working toward liberation while connecting their struggle to the legacies of those who came before.
As Kenyan writer and activist Binyavanga Wainaina reminds us:
“We were here before colonization, and we will be here long after. Queerness is African, too.”
Learn More and Support
- Book: “Queer African Reader” by Sokari Ekine and Hakima Abbas – A collection of essays, art, and reflections by African LGBTQ+ thinkers.
- Resource Hub: None on Record – Digital media documenting the stories of LGBTQ+ Africans.
- Organize: The Initiative for Equal Rights (TIERs) – A Nigerian nonprofit working to protect the rights of sexual minorities.
- Watch: “Call Me Kuchu” – A documentary about LGBTQ+ activism in Uganda.
- Follow: @FramelineFest – Frameline Distribution Frameline Distribution is the only nonprofit distributor that solely caters to LGBTQ+ film. Frameline’s collection has over 300 award-winning films that we distribute globally to universities, public libraries, film festivals, and community organizations
- Network: African Queer Youth Initiative – A pan-African organization led by and for queer youth.
- Read: 76 Crimes – Reporting on LGBTQ+ issues in Africa and beyond.
- Listen: AfroQueer Podcast – Stories about queer Africans navigating identity, love, and politics.
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