Founded | 2007 |
---|---|
Area served | United States of America |
Method | Campaigning, advocacy, support groups, public speaking, education |
Website | www |
The National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance (NQAPIA) is an American federation of Asian American, South Asian, Southeast Asian. and Pacific Islander LGBTQ organizations. NQAPIA was formed in 2007, as an outgrowth of the LGBT APA Roundtable working groups at the 2005 National Gay Lesbian Task Force Creating Change Conference in Oakland, California. [1] [2] NQAPIA seeks to build the capacity of local LGBT AAPI organizations, invigorate grassroots organizing, develop leadership, and challenge homophobia, racism, and anti-immigrant bias. [3] The organization "focuses on grass-roots organizing and leadership development." [4]
NQAPIA works with local LGBTQ AAPI groups to address a wide range of LGBTQ AAPI issues such as speaking out for immigration reform, partnering with the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force on a national survey of the needs and concerns of LGBTQ AAPIs, support convenings for queer women and South Asians, leading workshops on organizing LGBTQ AAPIs for social change, and hosting national trainings and issue briefings for leaders of LGBTQ AAPI organizations.
Thirty-four LGBTQ AAPI organizations from across the United States are members of NQAPIA. Two are national organizations. Most LGBTQ AAPI organizations are located in areas with large populations of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. The largest population centers are in the San Francisco Bay Area and the Greater Los Angeles Area. Following these are the communities in New York City, the metropolitan Washington, D.C., area, and New England. [5]
Some LGBTQ AAPI organizations are organized by ethnicity or gender.
Every three years, NQAPIA coordinates national conferences for queer Asian Pacific Islander American Issues. Prior conferences were held in Seattle, Washington and Washington, D.C., in 2009 and 2012 respectively. In 2015, NQAPIA's conference was held in Chicago, Illinois, from August 6–9, 2015. [6]
NQAPIA strives for inclusion of LGBT minority groups in both macro and micro-scopic scales through the use of conferences and community outreach programs. By providing education, social networks of support, and organization of federations and members, it aims to "press a positive agenda" to integrate LGBT racial and ethnic minorities in their communities. [7]
The NQAPIA organizes a weekend long training and issues briefing for leaders of LGBTQ API organizations. Local leaders from across the nation convene to network, learn about current issues, share strategies, and build the infrastructure of their respective organizations. In 2013, the NQAPIA Summit was in Hawai’i. NQAPIA Summits alternate between West and East Coasts. [8]
The NQAPIA curates projects and campaigns which empower the queer Asian communities around the nation.
A campaign focused on immigration reform and upholding LGBT Asian American Pacific Islander immigrant rights by "educating local organizations and leaders", engaging in media in various forms and mediums, publicizing the stories of undocumented LGBT Asian American Pacific Islanders (as well as undocumented Latinos), and analyzing immigration reform legislation and the effect that legislation changes will have. [9]
A multilingual campaign focused on educating Asian and Pacific Islander parents of LGBT youth, aimed to guide them in supporting their child and maintaining strong family bonds. This is accomplished through videos translated into Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Indonesian, Vietnamese, Thai, Khmer, Hmong, Lao, Hindi, Tagalog, Ilocano, Arabic, and other languages as well as multilingual leaflets, "family acceptance workshops", advertisements for LGBT pride month, and features on various news channels, such as MSNBC, NBC, and The Korea Times. [10]
DACA/DAPA are both programs targeted at undocumented immigrants, particularly families. DACA (deferred action for childhood arrivals) allows for individuals to remain in the United States and obtain work permits if they are qualified to do so; however, it is not a route to obtaining permanent residence or citizenship status. Due to "legal challenges", the expanded DACA and DAPA programs are currently unavailable, but the original 2012 DACA program is open to the public. DAPA (deferred action for parental accountability) is orchestrated by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services in order to temporarily provide aid to undocumented immigrants who are parents of U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents and provides "relief from deportation and work authorization" for three years, but is currently not accepting applications. [11]
"Uncovering Our Stories" was accomplished with the help of Mia Nakano, a director who worked on numerous other projects with similar themes. Its goal is to uncover the stories of immigrants who are "everyday" LGBT Asian American and Pacific Islanders, but whose stories rarely see coverage. The ultimate mission of this campaign is various levels of immigration reform, including greater family immigration rights and protections. It features Sapna Pandya, Erika Nunez, Tony Choi, Nebula Li, Rajat Dutta, Shweta Jumar, Maya Jafer, Dhaval Shah, John Sanchez, Chetam & Gaurav, Bupendra Ram, Sandy, Erwin de Leon, Alex Ong, Noel Bordador, Urooj Arshad, Linda & Lundy Khoy, and Sahar Shafqat. [12]
Through the use of printed postcards featuring various Asian American and Pacific Islanders, this campaign aims to "increase visibility of LGBT AAPIs". It features a variety of languages, from Korean to Thai to Bengali to Vietnamese, with a motif on front expressing support for same-sex marriage, immigrant rights, and queer/Asian pride. [13]
The NQAPIA Community Catalyst Awards are awarded to individual and organizations that have: [14]
Nominees are accepted through online submission. Past awardees include: [15]
NQAPIA releases yearly reports/news magazines detailing their activities, highlights of their national conference (if applicable), various features and articles, award information, financial statements.
For the American 2016 election, NQAPIA released a series of reports on the election, including voter guides in Chinese, Hindi, Korean, and Vietnamese; resources to understand the issues each candidate was campaigning on and to protect Asian American Pacific Islander voting rights; and information on how to vote.
Various infographics, articles, letters, blog posts, and the like are posted on a variety of topics related to Asian American Pacific Islanders' issues, such as political events.
Out & Equal Workplace Advocates is a United States lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBTQ) workplace equality non-profit organization headquartered in Oakland, California.
Trikone is a non-profit support, social, and political organization for South Asian bisexual, lesbian, gay, and transgender people. It was founded in 1986 in the San Francisco Bay Area and is one of the oldest groups of its kind in the world. South Asians affiliated with Trikone are from or trace their ancestry to the following countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Burma, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Tibet. Trikone published an eponymous magazine with an international base of subscribers several times a year. The magazine was the oldest South Asian LGBT magazine in the U.S., and ran from 1986 to 2014.
The Asian American and Pacific Islander Policy Research Consortium (AAPIPRC) focuses on critical policy issues facing the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. Conceived of as part of the White House Executive Order 13515 (2009) the consortium supports, promotes, and conducts applied social science and policy research. In addition, Professor Paul M. Ong proposed two courses of action for AAPIPRC, one which formalizes working relationships among university-based AAPI research institutions and the other which would include publishing the proceedings of the briefs to inform policy.
This is a timeline of notable events in the history of non-heterosexual conforming people of South Asian ancestry, who may identify as LGBTIQGNC, men who have sex with men, or related culturally-specific identities such as Hijra, Aravani, Thirunangaigal, Khwajasara, Kothi, Thirunambigal, Jogappa, Jogatha, or Shiva Shakti. The recorded history traces back at least two millennia.
Nikki Calma, better known as Tita Aida, is a social activist from San Francisco, California. She is a long-time advocate for HIV/AIDS awareness, particularly among Asian American communities, and for transgender people.
Crystal Jang is an LGBT activist based in San Francisco, California. She is one of the co-founders of the San Francisco Bay Area based organization, Asian Pacific Islander Queer Women and Transgender Community (APIQWTC), as well as community-based organization Older Asian Sisters in Solidarity (OASIS), which is now a part of APIQWTC.
This is a timeline of notable events in the history of non-heterosexual conforming people of Asian and Pacific Islander ancestry, who may identify as LGBTIQGNC, men who have sex with men, or related culturally-specific identities. This timeline includes events both in Asia and the Pacific Islands and in the global Asian and Pacific Islander diaspora, as the histories are very deeply linked. Please note: this is a very incomplete timeline, notably lacking LGBTQ-specific items from the 1800s to 1970s, and should not be used as a research resource until additional material is added.
Shamakami was an early organization of South Asian lesbians and bisexual women based in the United States. They published a newsletter of the same name between June 1990 and February 1997.
Lavender Phoenix, formerly known as API Equality – Northern California is an American social justice advocacy non-profit headquartered in San Francisco, California. Its mission is to build the power and increase the visibility of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer Asian Pacific Islander community.
GAPIMNY is an all-volunteer-run organization that provides a range of social, educational, and cultural programming for queer and transgender people who are Asian and/or Pacific Islander in the New York City metropolitan area to support each other. The organization's community building efforts is intricately tied to political education and mutual aid.
Sexuality, including same-sex sexuality, and other non-normative forms of sexuality have been central to the history of Chinatown, San Francisco. San Francisco's Chinatown, founded in 1848, is the first and largest in the United States. San Francisco was shaped by early Chinese immigrants, who came from the Guangdong province of southern China. These immigrants gathered in the Bay Area in order to join in the California Gold Rush and to build railroads in the American West. San Francisco's Chinatown made room for these early Chinese immigrants to live, and the area turned into a "bachelor society", where female prostitution was pervasive because of the Chinese Exclusion Act. As a racialized immigration region, Chinatown was viewed as an immoral place with the characteristics of "vice", "sluttery" and "sexual deviance" for a long time. These traits were incompatible with the mainstream culture and dominant norms of American society. From the mid-19th century, the state problematized Chinese female prostitution with the subject of sexual transmission, and the government began to go against industrial prostitution in Chinatown, as well as Chinese immigration. As the sex industry grew throughout the Bay Area, the government had to stop the anti-prostitution and anti-immigration law in the beginning of the 20th century. Just like the Castro district and other areas, Chinatown developed its own sexual industries and provided a variety of sexual entertainment to both immigrants and white visitors.
Seattle has a notably large LGBTQ community, and the city of Seattle has protected gay and lesbian workers since the passage of the Fair Employment Practice Ordinance in 1973. Seattle's LGBT culture has been celebrated at Seattle Pride which began in 1977 as Gay Pride Week. Gay cabaret traveled in a circuit including Seattle and San Francisco since the 1930s. Seattle had gay-friendly clubs and bars since the 1930s including The Casino in Underground Seattle at Pioneer Square which allowed same-sex dancing since 1930, and upstairs from it, The Double Header, in continuous operation since 1933 or 1934 until 2015, was thought to be the oldest gay bar in the United States.
Filipino American LGBT Studies is a field of studies that focus on the issues met by people at the intersection of Filipino American and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender identities.
Rev. Trinity Ordoña is a lesbian Filipino-American college teacher, activist, community organizer, and ordained minister currently residing in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is notable for her grassroots work on intersectional social justice. Her activism includes issues of voice and visibility for Asian/Pacific gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and queer individuals and their families, Lesbians of color, and survivors of sexual abuse. Her works include her dissertation Coming Out Together: an ethnohistory of the Asian and Pacific Islander queer women's and transgendered people's movement of San Francisco, as well as various interviews and articles published in anthologies like Filipino Americans: Transformation and Identity and Asian/Pacific Islander American Women: A Historical Anthology. She co-founded Asian and Pacific Islander Family Pride (APIFP), which "[sustains] support networks for API families with members who are LGBTQ," founded Healing for Change, "a CCSF student organization that sponsors campus-community healing events directed to survivors of violence and abuse," and is currently an instructor in the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Studies Department at City College of San Francisco.
The GLBTQ+ Asian Pacific Alliance, sometimes GAPA, is a 501(c)(4) non-profit social welfare organization that was incorporated in February 1988 in San Francisco, California, as a social support group for gay and bisexual Asian Pacific Islander (API) men. It engages in direct social, cultural and political advocacy, with a vision of "a powerful queer and transgender Asian and Pacific-Islander (QTAPI) community that is seen, heard, and celebrated," and a mission "to unite our families and allies to build a community through advocacy, inclusion, and love."
Kitty Tsui is an American author, poet, actor, and bodybuilder. She was the first known Asian American lesbian to publish a book.
For the Hong Kong actress and singer, see Miriam Yeung.
Glenn Duque Magpantay is the former executive director of the National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance, an instructor at Brooklyn Law School and Hunter College/CUNY, and a former civil rights attorney in the role of Democracy Program director for the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund. In 2023, Glenn D Magpantay was appointed as a Commissioner to the United States Commission on Civil Rights by Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer. He is chair of the LGBT Committee of the Asian American Bar Association of New York, former co-chair of the Gay Asian & Pacific Islander Men of New York, and recognized as an "authority on the federal Voting Rights Act and expert on Asian American political participation, including bilingual ballots, election reform, minority voter discrimination, multilingual exit polling, and census." He has served as a commissioner on the New York City Voter Assistance Commission. He is also a contributing writer for the Huffington Post. The Glenn Magpantay Leadership Award at his undergraduate alma mater, the State University of New York at Stony Brook, is named after him.