The Representation of LGBT Youth of Colour in Media

Abstract

As Bryan Washington so effortlessly demonstrates in his masterful debut, Lot, the combined difficulty of being both a racial minority and an LGBT youth struggling with their queer identity provides much heartbreak, frustration, and crisis. However, Lot perhaps unknowingly identifies an issue with LGBT representation, especially the representation of LGBT people of colour in the media: the brutal focus on the negative. Although many within the community struggle during some point in their lives with discrimination or feelings of shame, modern queer identities can also bring an incredibly joyful and positive atmosphere into a person’s life. Lot deals with a side to LGBT representation that the media greatly ignores; within the first three pages, our narrator is having his first sexual experience with another male, and despite it being repressed to keep his parents from hearing, it is honest and straightforward and fun.
In this article, I compare Lot to a study published in the Journal of Youth and Adolescence, ‘Emotional Distress Among LGBT Youth: The Influence of Perceived Discrimination Based on Sexual Orientation,’ which discusses emotional struggles between queer youths, most of whom are people of colour. I will be considering the representation of young LGBT people of colour in media and how they are shown to belong in our modern society.