New book spotlights experiences of gay sons of immigrants in Los Angeles
Shortly after the 2016 shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Anthony Ocampo began writing his most recent book.
Shortly after the 2016 shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Anthony Ocampo began writing his most recent book.
The book, “Brown and Gay in LA,” tells the stories of gay sons of immigrants in Los Angeles — specifically of Filipino Americans and Latinos — including his own. It publishes on Sept. 19.
“That event just really hit me pretty hard because a lot of the young men that I interviewed came of age in these kinds of places of queer Latinx or queer POC bars and clubs,” he said. “Myself included.”
Ocampo, a sociology professor at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, began working on the book a decade ago. He initially took a scholarly approach while writing it, but the Pulse nightclub shooting prompted him to change direction.
“It kind of stopped me in my tracks,” he said. “It just felt like the version of the book that I had at that point was too academic. And so I did a little soul-searching after the Pulse shooting and I felt like I had to write the book in a completely different way with a sense of urgency.”
Rating: 5