Mabel Hampton, a Black lesbian activist, was active during the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s, before later going on to participate in the first National Gay and Lesbian March on Washington in 1979.
Saidiya Hartman, a professor in English and comparative literature at Columbia University, said Hampton was a “Black lesbian icon” who witnessed a “radical transformation in the discourse around queer identity” leading to the “emergence of pride” in the years following the Stonewall riots.“Hampton's life bridged this really interesting period in which intimate and sexual mores were being contested in the early part of the 20th century to the total declaration of queer pride in the 1980s,” Hartman told NBC News.As a prominent intellectual and a.