Beginning to make documentaries in 1982 after finishing a master's degree at UC, Berkeley, Riggs first gained attention with an award-winning made-for-TV documentary, "Ethnic Notions: Portraits of Prejudice" (1987). "Ethnic Notions" focused particularly on the construction of what is connoted by contemporary African-American identity. Riggs points out how deeply routed strategies in American culture, specifically the creation of stereotypes, have fueled anti-black sentiment on both local and national levels. He continued such investigations in "Color Adjustment" (1991), his important, reflexive documentary on the history of black representation in mainstream TV. Here Riggs potently critiqued both the more obviously racist traditions of portraying humble and/or stupid people of African descent as well as more recent, blandly liberal yet compromised attempts to speak to the diversity of contemporary black life. Interviews and footage are regularly punctuated with the question, "Is this a positive image?", as the film ultimately suggests that issues of representation and racism are more complex than has generally been acknowledged, and that the problem of mass media imaging cannot be reduced to a dichotomy of "good image" vs. "bad image". Probably Riggs' best-known, most important and most controversial work, though, is his landmark "Tongues Untied" (1989), a bold mixed-mode work which combined documentary with political essay, memoir, satire, and performance pieces including poetry and dance. Riggs angrily suggests that contemporary identity politics wants him to be either black or gay, but not both at the same time. Furthermore, Riggs examines both the homophobia of the black community and the racism of queer folk. Highlights of the video include the hilarious lesson in "Snap!thology", the means of communication and commentary via finger-snapping used especially among gay men of color, and the problematic yet deliberately provocative final catchphrase, "Black men loving black men is THE revolutionary act." Highly acclaimed in many quarters, and the work that confirmed Riggs' status in experimental film and video circles, "Tongues Untied" became a site of struggle between gay activists and other liberal groups on the one hand and conservative religious and political organizations on the other with respect to both airings on PBS stations nationwide and its status as a work supported by a $5K grant from the National Endowment of the Arts. Footage from the film--especially scenes of nudity or representations of queer subcultures such as drag and SM--has in fact been recycled without copyright permission in the lobbying films and advertisement of anti-gay movements nationwide.

Other films Riggs made were less ambitious than "Tongues Untied" but continued with his interests in articulating the lives of black gay men and arguing for the importance of their perspective. "Non, je ne regrette rien/No Regrets" (1992) was a relatively simple short film which again used music and poetry, this time to examine more specifically the lives of black gay men living with HIV or full-blown AIDS. Some of the film's most powerful moments, however, came in the form of interviewed disclosures from a variety of men living with the disease. "Anthem" (1992), meanwhile, was a more experimental short film which again used explicit imagery in forcefully arguing for the validity of the black gay man as an American citizen, most memorably with shots of black gay male couples embracing before the American flag as the national anthem is played. Riggs was also an educator of note, becoming one of the youngest people ever to receive tenure in the arts and humanities at the University of California at Berkeley.