2025/07/23 by Nick J. Mulé, Kuir ë Garang · 1 voice
Psychology · Social Sciences · #African Sexualities and LGBTQ+ Issues #LGBTQ Health, Identity, and Policy
paper · doi:10.1080/02691728.2025.2525239
openalex publication_date 2025/07/23 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/14
Queer liberation is a concept that is derived from the tenets and principles of the gay liberation movement of the late 1960s and early ‘70s. The notion of liberation has a much longer history and is premised on a number of philosophical perspectives, including slavery abolition in Africa, the repression of Indigenous culture, and the extensive struggle of liberation movements in South America. Historical and philosophical trajectories speak to the evolution of liberationist discourse, just as there has been an evolving of gay liberation to queer liberation socially, politically, and culturally. What historical and philosophical perspectives have informed gay liberation and continue to inform queer liberation as part of the latter’s theorization is examined. Given that the 2SLGBTQI+ communities have identified themselves and organized as movements in some parts of the world and thrived as internally supportive communities in more repressive parts of the world in the pursuit of liberation based on their gender and sexual diversity, historical and philosophical underpinnings of this pursuit are pertinent in the development of queer liberation theory. Ultimately, an arc is created that links historical and philosophical liberationist pursuits to those of the gender and sexually diverse involving the decolonialization of heterosexism and cis-genderism.