In 1996, Detroit’s Black LGBT community activated a historic legacy-building project called Hotter Than July. It resulted from a confluence of events that required a collective response from people passionate about a community under the radar in a relatively hostile environment. As a member of this community, I observed and experienced constant pressures from oppressive systems undergirded by structural racism, homophobia, and inequality. The added pressure of the deadly AIDS/HIV epidemic proved catalytic to uniting a community to practice the Kwanzaa principle of collective work.

While serving as the lead organizer for the first eleven installments of Detroit’s Hotter Than July, I rarely thought about the foundational efforts of the elders and ancestors who came before me. Although stories and names of individuals were shared, my spirit wasn’t ready to receive the knowledge. Honestly, it took graduate school to lift the fog that had clouded my awareness for decades. I prescribed that contemporary events coalesced into a unique space and time in Detroit in which something historic arose. Then I came across the term “community wisdom” while conducting an assessment of a nonprofit called Common Future in Oakland, California.

Detroit’s Black queer community provided the validity and rigor needed to define community wisdom…

A professor requested me to document the organizing concept for Hotter Than July once my graduate journey began. I conceptualized it in three parts, in which the first was labeled “Community Wisdom”. I instantly realized there was knowledge produced that needed to be excavated to define the term from a Black queer perspective. What better community to examine than the knowledge produced and shared in a rough-edged place like Detroit - my hometown. As such, my graduate thesis is grounded in Black queer community wisdom in Detroit. Therefore, providing a basis in which further research can be done to examine my thesis within similarly oppressed communities impacted by race, gender, and sexuality.

In my analysis, there was not a standard definition of community wisdom in academic journals. Detroit’s Black queer community provided the validity and rigor needed to define community wisdom, while also illuminating its utility as a tool to cultivate resilience, agency, and solidarity. I’m mighty proud that Detroi’ts Hotter Than July continues to this day. I argue the radical possibility of Black queer pride in Detroit paved the way for Black LGBT prides to exist in cities like Nashville, Richmond, San Diego, and Johannesburg. I also believe from radical possibilities, Black queer community wisdom illuminates a pathway forward for Black liberation, radical love, and collective solidarity.