Links for Oregon Latinx LGBTQ History

Edited by George T. Nicola
Last updated August 5, 2020

There are about 500,000 Latinx (a gender-neutral noun that includes both Latino and Latina) Oregonians. Many of them are LGBTQ. GLAPN has often recognized these individuals in various ways, but this section is an effort to get much of it on the same page.

Web pages

PDX Latinx Pride Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/PDXlatinxpride/

Video

Our Families: LGBT Latino Stories

GLAPN's Latinx Queer Heroes

	Anyone who spends time exploring the Portland queer community will learn the name Laura Calvo. Her reputation for hard work and cool composure is well deserved. Laura’s public social justice career provides a role model for would-be activists everywhere. As an out Transgender woman … Read more …
	David Martinez grew up in Eastern Oregon, and was the first member of his family to graduate from high school and college. He is a co-founder of Portland Latino Gay Pride, and is currently Outreach & Coordination Coordinator for Portland Community College Rock Creek. Read more …
	Paul Southwick spent two years in reparative therapy while he was a student at George Fox University. He is a co-founder of OneGeorgeFox, an organization of LGBTQ and allied students and alumni, which addresses issues of faith and sexuality. Read more …
	Alec Esquivel took the State of Oregon to court over insurance that denied benefits for transition-related health care. The settlement of Esquivel v. Oregon eased the burdens on trans people locally, and set a legal precedent nationwide. Read more …
	Al Munguia is one of the original founders of Latino Gay Pride in Portland. His business is literally a model of equality for LGBTQ employees, and he represents Oregon on the state's Tourism Commission. Read more …
	Jules Garza is one of the most effective lesbian activists in Oregon. Read more …
	Edna Vasquez and Joachin Lopez demonstrate the power that music has to bridge cultural differences in the LGBTQ community. Read more …
	Christian Baeff, a native of Argentina, became the first LGBT Program Coordinator, of CAUSA, Oregon’s statewide Latino immigrant rights organization. Read more …
	Robin Castro and John Halseth are two of Portland's highest-profile LGBTQ advocates. Read more …
	Gisella Contreras is a generous and dynamic presence in Portland's Latinx community. In 2011, she related her experiences in a Basic Rights Oregon video “Our Families: LGBT Latino Stories”. She courageously recounted how her family rejected her transition. In 2012, she graced the cover of PQ Monthly’s first ever issue. She often makes special appearances at colleges and radio shows to share her story. In 2016, Gisella was selected as Miss Trans Oregon. Read more …
	Ernesto Dominguez, a gay cisgender Latino, has been out since he was 14, and has been an activist almost from the beginning. His work as Youth Technology Specialist at Cascade Aids Project got him national attention in 2011 for use of social media in outreach to young people of color, and his resumé includes work with Basic Rights Oregon and Planned Parenthood. Currently he is a student at Portland's Concordia University, a private, Lutheran, school, where he is the first out, gay, immigrant student body president the school’s history. Read more …
	Carmen Gutiérrez is a Central American from El Salvador. Jensi Albright is a North American from Maine. They met in Portland, Oregon in 2004, fell in love and began a decade-long battle for a permanent life together. They lobbied at every level; they married both in Washington and Oregon; and they worked with filmmaker Dan Sadowsky who made Love and Country, a documentary about their struggle to just have a life together. Read more …
	Elaina Medina is a proud queer Latinx woman, born in New Mexico. After earning her Master's degree, she took a lead position at SMYRC (Sexual Minorities Youth Resource Center). SMYRC and Bridge 13 have both grown in resource and capacity under Elaina’s leadership. The SMYRC space is now open 5 days a week and serves 30-40 youth a night. Bridge 13 has grown into a program of 2 incredible Community Educators and an Engagement and Education Specialist whose focus is completely work with youth in schools. Read more …
	Adrian Larsen Sanchezis a clinical psychologist who shares his practice, Portland Mental Health & Wellness, with his husband, Brad Larsen Sanchez, who is also a clinical psychologist. Adrian serves on the Oregon Psychoanalytic Center’s Diversity Committee, and works with a broad range of patients, including LGBTQ, people of color, and immigrant communities. Read more …
	Vanessa La Torre is currently the Youth Education and Wellness Manager at Latino Network, a cultural-specific community based organization serving the Latino Community in Multnomah and Washington County. She was part of the team that made Latino cultural adaptations as well as LGBTQ inclusiveness adaptations to Making Proud Choices, the curriculum for the trainings, ensuring it resonated for all our youth. She is also the lead on enhancing the existing sexuality education curriculum for Latino parents, in particular, adding a lesson plan on gender and orientation. Read more …
	HUGO GONZALEZ VENEGAS is an immigrant from Mexico, a gay man, the first of his family to attend college. He came out at age 16 and was kicked out of the family home, relying on the youth services of Phoenix Rising and Harry's Mother to survive. He became an American citizen in 2011, and managed to go to law school. Hugo is a Shepherd Scholar, recipient of the Bill and Ann Shepherd Legal Scholarship (named for the co-founders of PFLAG Portland), which helps law students interested in furthering LGBTQ rights. Currently, Hugo is the Diversity & Inclusion Coordinator at the Oregon State Bar as well as Chair of OGALLA, The LGBT Bar Association of Oregon. Read more …
	JUAN ANTONIO "TONY" TRUJILLO was born in Tacoma and raised in a devout Mormon family. Since 1997 he has taught Spanish and applied linguistics at Oregon State University, working to provide a space in academia for those who inhabit intersectional queer identities. Juan Antonio is co-organizer of Tag! Queer Shorts Festival, (formerly the Corvallis Queer Film Festival) exclusively featuring short films made by LGBTQIA+ filmmakers that center intersectional voices often lost in mainstream queer festivals. His festival debut short film, Companions: Lessons from Gay Mormon Missionaries looks at the conflict between religious belief and sexuality faced by queer missionaries.Read more …
	DR. ERNESTO MARTINEZ is a professor in the Department of Indigenous, Race, and Ethnic Studies (IRES) at the University of Oregon. His work – both academic and artistic – explores how racially and sexually marginalized communities in the United States use literature, art, and film to produce knowledge about their lives despite being subjected to forms of violence that distort their reality and that challenge their credibility as knowers. He is also the writer of the children's book When We Love Someone, We Sing to Them, illustrated by Maya Christina Gonzalez, as well as the writer and co-producer of the short film La Serenata, directed by Adelina Anthony. Read more …