Analysis Of Two Boys Kissing By David Levithan

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Two Boys Kissing by David Levithan is a story of seven gay teenagers who are all in different situations and stages of coming to terms with their sexuality. With hopes of making a statement about homosexuality and homophobia, Harry and Craig set out to set the world record for longest kiss; while their friends Peter and Neil are a long term couple, Cooper is just figuring out what being gay means to him and how to deal with it. When it comes to conceptualizing gender one can think that it is the range of characteristics pertaining to, and differentiating between, masculinity and femininity. In Levithan’s novel, these characteristics include biological sex, sex-based social structures, and gender identity. Each character in Two Boys Kissing …show more content…

Avery is harassed by bullies daily but admirably is able to stay calm and controlled. Society places a large importance on gender and how one performs it, so when Avery’s view from his gender is different from his biological sex, it causes an internal struggle within him because of how society views and expects of gender norms. Avery is a great example of the idea of gender inversion, which is known to be a role reversal of men acting like women and women acting like men, in other words the common way of thinking about homosexuality. In Two Boys Kissing, Levithan does a great job at depicting Avery’s characteristic traits, such a good job that in fact the reader it able to understand that Avery is not “acting” like the opposite sex but rather performing the gender in which he truly believes himself to be. “We wish we could show you the world as it sleeps. Then you’d never have any doubt about how similar, how trusting, how astounding and vulnerable we all are” (20). Avery is just an example of many teenagers who doubt the equality of their …show more content…

During the thirty-two hours, twelve minutes, and ten second duration of their kiss bullies, complicated feelings, and angry parents are presented. In addition to gender identity, gender performativity is the idea promoted by Judith Butler that means being something consists of doing it rather than being an objective quality of the body. The seven boys in this novel all preform their gender in distinctive ways. As said in lecture when talking about gender expression, “…gender is like a language we use to communicate ourselves to others and to understand ourselves” (Intro to GWSS Lecture, November 1,

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