Sitting in Outwrite Bookstore, awash in Sunday morning light, Monique Carry appears radiant as she speaks about the All My Children project’s unique marriage of academic research and social justice. AMC is the nonprofit organization that Carry co-founded with her research partner Shannon J. Miller in order to help African-American LGBT youth and their families. Carry and Miller serve as co-executive directors of the group.
AMC works to understand the dynamics of LGBT youth and their families and communities, and “raise awareness about the consequences of anti-lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning bias within African American families, faith centers, and communities,” states the group’s website.
Carry elaborates on this, saying that both LGBT youth of color and white LGBT youth deal with many of the same issues, though in uniquely different ways, leading to social isolation. AMC understands that the social isolation faced by African-American youth dealing with sexual orientation and gender identity is created in part by growing up within a culture that does not address these issues.