Minnesota Men of Color

From OutHistory
Revision as of 05:37, 2 February 2012 by Vanc0092 (talk | contribs)
(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)
Jump to navigationJump to search

1433 East Franklin Avenue, Minneapolis, MN


OPEN ENTRY: This entry is open to collaborative creation by anyone with evidence, citations, and analysis to share, so no particular, named creator is responsible for the accuracy and cogency of its content. Please use this entry's Comment section at the bottom of the page to suggest improvements about which you are unsure. Thanks.
Minnesotan people of color exist within a societal structure that continues to garner European descendants with unequal privileges.


Local racism is evident in the geography of Minneapolis—where people of color were forced to live in the city’s “Northside” (see: Sumner/Glenwood) and South-Central districts for nearly a century.


It is also evident in St. Paul, where nonwhite citizens lived in the Rondo Neighborhood and on [[The [West Side Flats]].

SVC mnmenofcolor.jpg

Minnesota Men of Color poster. Part of a campaign funded by the Ryan White CARE Act. Courtesy of the Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection.


The civil rights act of 1968 made the practices of redlining and restrictive housing covenants illegal. By that time, the “Gay Ghettos” of Minneapolis and St. Paul already established near Loring Park and Grand Avenue—once exclusively-white areas. This geographic separation and other economic disparities led to a divide between white and nonwhite queer communities.


Svc laotian.jpg

Laotian pamphlet with HIV/AIDS information from the New York Department of Health. Minnesota Men of Color networked with other groups across the nation and shared materials with them. Courtesy of the Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection.

In 1999, Nicholas Metcalf founded Minnesota Men of Color (MMC) while finishing Graduate School and raising a child. The organization—serving the “Arab/Middle Eastern, Asian Pacific Islander, Chicano/Latino and Native American Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender (LGBT) population in the state of Minnesota”—focused a sizable proportion of its attention to HIV/AIDS services."(1)


A Lakota Native American, Metcalf stated in a Gay Parent Magazine interview that “Racism is very much alive and well in the queer community by lacking inclusion of people of color.”(2)


He continued “HRC (Human Rights Campaign) and NGLTF (National Gay and Lesbian Task Force) are not on my reservation. PFLAG (Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians And Gays) isn’t there either. Institutions that are sort of pro-white LGBT people are good but they don’t look or behave anything like my world. They’re part of my world in regards to being gay, they are great institutions in that sense. But they only accept part of me, not all of me.”(3)


MMC, which disbanded in 2009, was among the first organizations to specifically invest time and resources to queer people of color.



This entry is part of:

Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN: 100 Queer Places in Minnesota History, (1860-2010)



(1)Acain, Angeline. " Yellow Hawk and the Child of His Heart: An Interview with Nicholas Metcalf." Gay Parent Magazine, 2002. http://www.gayparentmag.com/11323.html

(2) Ibid.

(3) Ibid.