Queer Places:
2820 SW 13th St, Miami, FL 33145
Joseph Michel Carrier, Jr. (December 23, 1927 - November 28, 2020) was born on December 23, 1927, in Miami, Florida. He enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1945, but
was still in boot camp when World War II ended, and was discharged early. After earning a BA in Geography from the
University of Miami in 1950, he was recalled by the Marines for fourteen months and completed his tour as a sergeant. In
1952, he received an MA in Economics from Purdue University. The following year Carrier traveled on a Fulbright
Scholarship to India, where he researched the economic effects of energy resource distribution in the northeastern region
of the country. In 1954, he taught geography at the University of Miami. He then relocated to California where, after a brief
stint at North American Aviation, he joined the Rand Corporation, for whom he worked from 1956 to 1968 as a research
analyst on various projects. In 1968, upon returning to the United States after performing field research as a
counterinsurgency specialist in Vietnam, Carrier was told of his pending dismissal for "economic reasons." In fact, his fellow
employees in Saigon had reported a suspected homosexual affair with a Vietnamese Air Force officer to his superior in the
Santa Monica office. At the time Rand considered homosexuals a security risk and subject to dismissal; however Carrier
negotiated his departure from the company without admitting to the affair. His resignation provided Carrier the opportunity
to return to school to study anthropology. Professor Duane Metzger of the University of California at Irvine was open to the
concept of a graduate student researching male homosexuality, but advised Carrier to avoid mentioning homosexuality
when applying to the graduate program. The UC Irvine program allowed one off-campus expert to serve on graduate
advisory committees. Carrier sought out Evelyn Hooker, a UCLA professor and research authority on homosexuality. At
Metzger's suggestion Carrier focused on homosexual behaviors in Mexico. He obtained a National Institute of Health
two-year pre-doctoral fellowship and from the autumn of 1969 to the spring of 1971, conducted research in Guadalajara,
observing and interviewing urban Mexican mestizos men who had sex with men. This was the first doctoral-level
anthropological field research focused on homosexual behaviors. He received his Ph.D. the following year.
With no prospects for a position in sex research, Carrier briefly served as a staff officer at the National Academy of Science,
where he researched the effects of herbicides utilized by American military forces in South Vietnam. From 1973 to 1987, he
worked part-time as an evaluator of experimental law enforcement programs in the state of California. The part-time nature
of this work allowed Carrier to continue his research, and extend the scope of fieldwork into the Mexican states he passed
through on his drive from California to Guadalajara. The rise of the AIDS epidemic underscored the importance of Carrier's
work, as his research on Mexican men who have sex with men provided public health officials with insights on this
previously undocumented world. In the fall of 1987, Carrier joined the Orange County Health Agency AIDS Community
Education Project (ACEP) to develop effective HIV/AIDS educational materials for the men of Mexican origin in Orange
County. In a county biographical sketch published in 1991 he is described as the health agency's Chief Social Scientist. He
retired in 1992. In his final year with ACEP, Carrier conducted an ethnographic study of the sexual behaviors of men of
Vietnamese origin in Orange County. He continues to study men of Mexican and Vietnamese origins in order to develop a
greater understanding of their sexual behaviors that will allow service providers to create and implement more effective
HIV/AIDS educational programs. In 1995, the culmination of more than twenty-five years of his research, De Los Otros:
Intimacy and Homosexuality among Mexican Men was published.
As a respected authority in the cultural study of male homosexuality, his first job after receiving a PhD in 1972 was with the National Academy of Sciences Committee on the Effects of Herbicides in Vietnam. He returned to South Vietnam for Committee work in 1972-1973. Carrier made his first Hanoi trip in 1994. He volunteered there with North Vietnamese professors researching the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Continuing this work he traveled extensively in Southeast Asia and India until 2006. At 80 his life took a dramatic turn when he began a collaboration with Danish Vietnamese artist Danh Vo. They traveled together to the Central Highlands of South Vietnam, making contact with a tribal family that continued up to the time of his death. Some details of what happened to the tribal people following the Communist takeover of Vietnam in 1975 are included in his last book that he published in August 2016, A LIfe of Adventures with Serendipity: An Autobiography.
My published books:/p>
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