Radical Care in the Margins: Queer Indigenous Resistance to Settler Colonialism and HIV/AIDS in the Twin Cities

• In Event: AIDS and the Crisis of American Empire

Abstract

This paper examines the radical care practices of queer Indigenous organizers in the Twin Cities during the HIV/AIDS epidemic from the 1980s through the 1990s, highlighting their use of space to challenge both the settler colonialism embedded in homonormative politics and the systemic neglect of marginalized communities. Focusing on the Minnesota American Indian AIDS Task Force (MAIATF), Minnesota Men of Color (MMC), and the Minnesota Transgender Health Coalition, this study explores how these collectives mobilized Indigenous epistemologies and mutual aid to create care networks that directly addressed the structural inequities underpinning the epidemic. Through culturally rooted interventions, these organizations expanded the scope of HIV prevention while fostering “communal intimacies” as an alternative to the neoliberal, individualist frameworks that dominated mainstream LGBTQ responses.

A focal point of this analysis is the Twin Cities Pride Festival at Loring Park, which became a contested site of inclusion and resistance. The Power to the People stage, established by MMC in the early 2000s, exemplified how queer Indigenous and other queer of color activists reconfigured festival space to center cultural expression, communal care, and political visibility. This spatial practice directly challenged the exclusionary logics of white-dominated LGBTQ organizations, which privileged homonormative respectability and corporate sponsorship over intersectional solidarity and grassroots activism. By hosting performances, community outreach, and cultural rituals within the margins of the festival, queer Indigenous activists reclaimed space as a site for healing, resistance, and decolonial praxis.

Drawing on archival research and oral histories, this paper situates these efforts within a broader critique of the settler colonial and neoliberal dynamics that shaped public health responses to HIV/AIDS. It shows that mainstream AIDS Service Organizations (ASOs) often perpetuated these dynamics by focusing narrowly on biomedical interventions and neglecting the structural determinants of health—such as homelessness, racism, and economic disenfranchisement—that disproportionately impacted Indigenous and other communities of color. In contrast, the radical care practiced by MAIATF and MMC foregrounded collective well-being, cultural survival, and the interdependence of health and sovereignty.

The paper also engages the political and cultural stakes of these interventions, tracing how queer Indigenous activists reimagined care as a form of resistance to settler colonial erasure and as a pathway to reclaiming Indigenous cultural teachings and identities. By integrating two-spirit politics and decolonial frameworks, these organizations demonstrated the possibilities of creating coalitional spaces that bridged racial, sexual, and gender differences in pursuit of liberation.

In addressing the intersection of HIV/AIDS, settler colonialism, and neoliberalism, this paper contributes to critical conversations in American Studies about the crises of late-stage U.S. empire. It underscores how queer Indigenous organizing offers vital lessons for rethinking care, community, and resistance within the ongoing struggles for decolonization and health justice. By reclaiming the physical and symbolic spaces of Pride, queer Indigenous activists not only expanded the horizons of LGBTQ politics but also modeled alternative futures rooted in mutual care and collective liberation.

Author

• René Esparza, Washington University in St. Louis