Queer of color critique is a methodology that recognizes the intersections of race, gender, class, sexuality, capital, and nation, and disidentifies with the universality of social categories present in canonical sociology and historical materialism. Roderick Ferguson is credited with coining this term in his 2004 book Aberrations in Black, and draws from woman of colorfeminism, postcolonial studies, queer theory and African American studies. In his critique of canonical sociology, Ferguson argues that racialized heteronormativity and heteropatriarchy have played a conspicuous role in shaping sociology and social policy, and recognizes its intersection with revolutionary nationalism. Queer of color critique operates as a method for building unlikely coalitions across different identity categories. In framing queer of color critique, Ferguson draws from Barbara Smith and the Combahee River Collective's use of coalitional politics to address gender, race, and sexuality in context with capitalist expansion.
Influences
Queer of color critique has been taken up by multiple scholars as an attempt at a more intersectional framework on which to build and extend their work in various, sometimes intersecting academic subjects.
Queerness and indigeneity
Though most references at the intersection of queerness and indigeneity fall on Two-Spirit identity and ideas surrounding it, queer of color critique extends the discussion to settler colonialism, future potentialities of Native identity and life, and general discourse about how Native Studies as an academic study can benefit from a sort of "queering". According to scholar Andrea Smith, looking at indigeneity from this perspective questions the limitations of a "subjectless" or "postidentity" analysis in regards to the shedding of a particular ethnic identity, which in itself has roots in colonialist and nationalist ideology. On the other hand, even this sort of critique does not fully acknowledge the extent of the absence of indigeneity in the context of direct and indirect investment in settler colonialism by those of color doing the critiquing.
De-colonial studies
The unraveling of colonialist ideology,—the belief in a normative society—according to scholar Emma Perez, is necessary to fully understand national histories and identities, specifically of queer individuals.
Queer diasporic critique can be considered an extension of and complement to queer of color critique in that it considers ethnic and cultural identity as an underlying context when analyzing and critiquing arguments based on Eurocentric, white centered queer theories, as well as critiquing the heteronormativity of area studies. Oftentimes, these ideas are connected to ideas of nationhood and national identity. In this respect, critique emphasizing diaspora tends to focus more on a "global restructuring of capital and its attendant gender and sexual hierarchies" and the creation of "home" in regards to diaspora and transnationalism.
Queer Muslims
An example of queer of color critique in practice can be seen in the analysis of queer Muslims in Europe done by scholar Fatima El-Tayeb, which touches on the larger themes explored in queer theory. Among these is the idea of "coming-out" as a person of diaspora, which challenges the currently held notion of its role in the creation of a "normative, healthy and desirable LGBT identity". Another describes how the idea of Islamophobia permeates into the intersectional oppressions faced by queer Muslims in the west. The ideas of migration and "home" are also critiqued in that the ethnic migrant laborer lives amongst an "increasingly segregated, criminalized and policed multi-ethnic population of color". These queer diasporic and queer of color critiques therefore act as a lens through which to view homonormativity and the various facets through which is functions. As a type of community manifestation of this type of critique, the queer of color activist group takes an intersectional, colored approach to queer activism. This helps undermine binaries such as the "Muslim/European dichotomy to the normative coming out narrative", which, according to El-Tayeb, perpetuate homonormativity and racism.
Scholarship
Some notable scholars who have incorporated queer of color critique into their work are Roderick Ferguson, Jesus Values-Morales, Andrea Smith, Gayatri Gopinath, Fatima El-Tayeb, Martin Manalansan IV, Juana María Rodríguez, José Esteban Muñoz, Emma Perez, Edward Brockenbrough, Salvador Vidal-Ortiz, Amy Villarejo, Jasbir Puar, Scott Lauria Morgensen, Kevin K. Kumashiro, Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes, Chandan Reddy, Jennifer C. Nash, and others.
