Intersectionality

What Is Intersectionality?

A framework for understanding how different aspects of a person's identity - race, gender, class, sexuality, disability, nationality, age - overlap and interact to create unique experiences. Coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1989, building on earlier conceptual work of the Combahee River Collective (1977) - a group of Black feminist lesbian activists in Boston whose 1977 Statement is the foundational document of intersectionality as applied to LGBTQIA+ experience.

Race & LGBTQIA+ Identity

LGBTQIA+ communities are racially diverse, but LGBTQIA+ spaces have historically been dominated by white people and perspectives. LGBTQIA+ people of color face simultaneous racism and homophobia/transphobia. Key figures:

  • Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera - Black and Latina trans women central to Stonewall; co-founded STAR
  • Bayard Rustin (1912–1987) - Black gay civil rights organizer; architect of the 1963 March on Washington; marginalized due to his gay identity within the movement
  • The Combahee River Collective - Black lesbian feminist activists; foundational to intersectionality theory; named after Harriet Tubman's 1863 Combahee River Raid

Disability & LGBTQIA+ Identity

  • Autistic people are significantly overrepresented in non-binary and LGBTQIA+ communities (some research: 15–35% of autistic people identify as LGBTQIA+)
  • Disabled LGBTQIA+ people face barriers including providers who don't see disabled people as sexual beings
  • Xenogender vocabulary developed partly within autistic LGBTQIA+ communities

Class & LGBTQIA+ Identity

  • LGBTQIA+ youth represent ~40% of homeless youth in the US despite being ~7% of the youth population - primarily due to family rejection (Williams Institute; True Colors United)
  • Gender-affirming care and LGBTQIA+-competent providers are expensive and inaccessible to many working-class people
  • Rural LGBTQIA+ people face greater isolation; moving to a city is a common survival strategy requiring class-based resources

Age & Generational Differences

  • Older LGBTQIA+ people lived through criminalization, psychiatric diagnosis, and the AIDS crisis; some experience isolation in elder care facilities
  • Average coming out age has dropped from early 20s in the 1980s to approximately 16–17 now
  • "Queer" is embraced by many younger people but remains painful for some older people who experienced it only as a weapon

Migration & Immigration Status

Immigration status is a major and often overlooked axis of LGBTQIA+ experience.

  • Asylum seekers fleeing persecution may have to "prove" their sexual orientation or gender identity to skeptical immigration officials, often using crude and invasive standards. Recognition and treatment vary enormously by receiving country (see §3.5).
  • Undocumented LGBTQIA+ people face compounded vulnerability: fear of deportation can prevent them from reporting violence, accessing healthcare, or seeking community support.
  • Newcomers may move from a hostile country to a more accepting one yet remain isolated by language, racism within LGBTQIA+ spaces, and loss of their original community and family networks.
  • LGBTQIA+ migrants are sometimes caught between a homophobic diaspora community and a xenophobic wider society, belonging fully to neither.

This axis is especially relevant in Europe, where asylum and migration intersect directly with LGBTQIA+ rights.