Contesting public discourses on sexuality in Kenya: A reading of Kevin Mwachiro's Invisible

Abstract

abstractThe debate on homosexuality has recently gained heightened public interest in Kenya and her neighbour Uganda. This debate tends to depict non-heterosexual people as sick people who need medical care or cultural reorientation. Consequently, stories of the lives of gay persons are difficult to come by in these countries. This briefing is a critical reading of Kevin Mwachiro's Invisible: Stories from Kenya's Queer Community. I look at the narratives of public coming out in the Kenyan gay community in this anthology in the context of the current public debate on sexuality. The narratives in Mwachiro's book cut across gender, age, tribe, religion, educational background and social economic classes. My argument is that the very existence of a book that documents stories of gays in Kenya demonstrates that despite the hypocrisy and vitriol with which the subject is discussed, the gay community has always been and is a part of Kenyan society. I analyse the narratives in Invisible with the intention to demonstrate that the subject of sexuality can no longer simply be relegated to the periphery of national discourses. This short briefing argues that the stories of the Kenyan non-heteronormative should be heard alongside those of everyone else; that an understanding of Kenyan postcolonial culture and identity would not be complete until the voices of all sections of this society have been heard.