Mozambican “tolerance” toward homosexuality: Lusotropicalist myth and homonationalism

Abstract

In this article, the result of ethnographic research on the LGBT community over the last five years in Mozambique, I will deal theoretically with a hegemonic elite discourse alleging tolerance of homosexuality in this country. I will review previous scholarly works on this theme and analyze the recurrence of this discourse among certain elite groups, such as local activists, journalists, and politicians. I conclude that this discourse is reminiscent of the Lusotropicalist myth transformed into a new kind of homonationalism and that it explicitly reverberates in the current political strategies of LGBT activism in Mozambique.