BIPOC

BIPOC stands for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. Pronounced "bye-pock," it is a mainly U.S. term that gained wide use around 2020. It deliberately names Black and Indigenous people to highlight their unique relationship to whiteness and the specific, compounded forms of systemic racism they face, which the broader phrase "people of color" can flatten or erase. The BIPOC Project, which helped popularize the term, frames it as a way to build solidarity among communities of color while keeping those distinct histories visible. In LGBTQ+ contexts, BIPOC is used to acknowledge how racism intersects with homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia, and to push back against queer advocacy that defaults to centering white experiences.