In his work about gay life in New York City, George Chauncey seeks to dispel the various myths about the gay lifestyle before the Civil Rights era of the 60’s. He distills the misconceptions into three major myths: “…isolation, invisibility, and internalization” (Chauncey 1994, 2). He believes a certain image has taken in the public mind where gays did not openly exist until the 60’s, and that professional historians have largely ignored this era of sexual history. He posits such ideas are simply counterfactual. Using the city of New York, a metropolitan landscape where many types of people confluence together, he details a thriving gay community. Certainly it is a community by Chauncey’s reckoning; he shows gay men had a large network of bar, clubs, and various other cultural venues where not only gay men intermingled the larger public did as well. This dispels the first two principle myths that gay men were isolated internally from other gay men or invisible to the populace. As to the internalization of gay men, they were not by any degree self-loathing. In fact, Chauncey shows examples of gay pride such a drag queen arrested and detained in police car in a photo with a big smile (Chauncey 1994, 330). Using a series of personal interviews, primary archival material from city repositories, articles, police reports, and private watchdog groups, Chauncey details with a preponderance of evidence the existence of a gay culture in New York City, while at the same time using secondary scholarship to give context to larger events like the Depression and thereby tie changes to the gay community to larger changes in the society.
But he does not simply dispel the myths of early 20th century gay life, he also details such myths to...
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...e social changes brought about this period. He cites the growing sensationalism of sex covered in the media as a prime driver behind the sexual orthodoxy in American culture (Chauncey 1994, 359). During this witch hunt, he draws a silver lining. Using the scholarship of others such as John D’Emilio, he cites that this period brought a greater bond to the gay community by forging brotherhood of adversity which would then come back into play in the 1960’s as an experiential touchstone for the Civil Rights era (Chauncey 1994, 360). Chauncey nestles his own narrative of the gay community in New York within the larger narrative of gay life in America filling in the gaps of secondary sources through his own primary work.
Bibliography
Chauncey, George. 1994. Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the
Gay Male World 1890-1940. New York: Basic Books.
“A Spectacle in Color: The Lesbian and Gay Subculture of Jazz Age Harlem” by Eric Garber discusses how the Great Migration to Harlem was not only significant for blacks but for gays and lesbians as well. Garber argues that Harlem’s gay subculture was at its peak in the 1920’s and declined to shell of its previous self after the Stock Market crash in 1929. He goes on to discuss how in black communities, specifically Harlem, there were troubles of segregation, racism, and economic despair, but that being gay in Harlem added new troubles.
In Vicki L. Eaklor’s Queer America, the experiences of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, and transgender people in the years since the 1970s gay liberation movement are described as a time of transformation and growth. The antigay movement, threatened, now more than ever, created numerous challenges and obstacles that are still prevalent today. Many of the important changes made associated with the movement were introduced through queer and queer allied individuals and groups involved in politics. Small victories such as the revision of the anti discrimination statement to include “sexual orientation”, new propositions regarding the Equal Rights Amendment and legalized abortion, were met in turn with growing animosity and resistance from individuals and groups opposed to liberal and
Historian David Carter, provides an intriguing in-depth look into the historical impact of the Stonewall Riots in Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution. This engaging book adds to the genre of sexual orientation discrimination. Carter extensively analyzes the various factors that played a role in igniting the Stonewall riots and the historical impact that the riots had on the Gay Revolution and movement for gay equality. Through the use of interviews, newspapers, and maps, Carter argues that the riots were a product of many geographical, social, political, and cultural factors. Carter further argues that the riots ultimately led to the forming of the Gay Revolution and caused sexual orientation to be a protected category in the growing movement for civil rights. Carter’s book provides a well-structured argument, supported mainly by primary evidence, into the different factors that contributed to the riots as well as a detailed account of the events that transpired during the riots and the political attitudes towards homosexuality in America during this time.
“The unprecedented growth of the gay community in recent history has transformed our culture and consciousness, creating radically new possibilities for people to ‘come out’ and live more openly as homosexuals”(Herdt 2). Before the 1969 Stonewall riot in New York, homosexuality was a taboo subject. Research concerning homosexuality emphasized the etiology, treatment, and psychological adjustment of homosexuals. Times have changed since 1969. Homosexuals have gained great attention in arts, entertainment, media, and politics. Yesterday’s research on homosexuality has expanded to include trying to understand the different experiences and situations of homosexuals (Ben-Ari 89-90).
In nineteenth century, a discourse on homosexuality started to occur; meanwhile, boundaries between black and white became more and more clear. (16) It was the era when the issues that were considered as minority started to appear, and it was also the time when people were reinforcing their ideal “social norms” into the society. It was a dark age for LGBT people, African American people and female. In the article, Scientific Racism and the Homosexual Body, the author, Siobhan Sommerville, makes a strong connection between scientific racism and sexology and women’s bodies. “Although some historians of the scientific discourse on sexuality have included brief acknowledgement of nineteenth century discourses of racial difference in their work,
Both parts of Tony Kushner's play Angels in America paint a painfully truthful picture of what gay men go through. In most cases, they suffer either inner anguish or public torment. Sometimes they must endure both. Being homosexual in America is a double-edged sword. If you publicly announce that you are gay, you suffer ridicule and are mocked by the ignorant of society; but if you keep your homosexuality a secret, you are condemned to personal turmoil. Kushner's work attempts to make America take a close look at itself and hopefully change its ways. The fear of public scrutiny forces many gay men into a life of denial and secrecy.
It is often found that the stereotypical “butch” and “femme” pairing are more visible than other lesbian relationships. However, this does not mean that they do not exist. The ever-growing popularity of the lesbian social sphere has symbolized both difficulties and effects of identifying with such a label. The label or identity itself, though distinctly separating lesbians from “normal” heterosexuals begins to exhibit pre-existing conflict experienced by gay males: “there’s always been something wrong (Aldrich, 38).” This quote implies the conditioned and ingrained belief that homosexuality’s “taboo” existence was more than just wrong, but distasteful and something that society should look down upon for being an “abnormality.” Sometimes, this social reality for lesbians made it hard for them to “come out the closet” and be visible. This experience is exemplified as “The repressed lesbian has a harder time of it, for she is less aware of her abnormality (Aldrich, 41).” Additionally, to be able to clearly and accurately identify “the lesbian is to meet the many women she is at close range; to see her against her various backgrounds, hear her sundry voices, and familiarize yourself with the diverse facades of her several lives (Aldrich, 42).” Here, the presence of the “double life” is demonstrated to further analyze the lack of privileges that the lesbian community had, including the social aspect of their
The difficulty of determining what gay and lesbian text is poses a challenge in finding material applicable to queer theory. However, being subtitled as a Gay Fantasia on National Themes by its openly homosexual author, Tony Kushner’s Angels in America is most appropriately viewed through this lens, as the play’s content directly illustrates the purpose of queer theory. Entangling the personal with the political, Kushner seeks to deconstruct the heteronormative agenda by illustrating the relationship between Reagan, AIDS, religion, and homosexuality through their impact on his characters. All struggling with some aspect of homosexuality, each perspective told in the play expresses the depth at which societal norms damage the freedom of American citizens. With sexual identity at the f...
The media considers the1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City the spark of the modern gay rights movement. This occurred after the police raided the Stonewall bar, a popular gay bar in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. Allyn argues that the new energy and militancy generated by the riot played a crucial role in creating the gay liberation movement. Arguably, the Stonewall Riots have come to resemble the pivotal moment in gay rights history largely because it provided ways for the gay community to resist the social norms. In fact, the riots increased public awareness of gay rights activism (Allyn 157). Gay life after the Stonewall riots, however, was just as varied and complex as it was before. In the following era, ho...
. Gianoulis, Tina. "Gay Liberation Movement." In St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture., edited by Thomas Riggs, 438-43. 2nd ed. Vol. 2. Detroit: St. James, 2013. Gale Virtual Reference Library (GALE|CX2735801056).
...r scene was instrumental in the development of a culture and identity for homosexuals. In today's contemporary world, we see the effects of what was done during the late 1800's and early 1900's. Today, there are numerous balls in which homosexuals are able to gather on a larger scale and engage in almost ritual practices. The bar scene has flourished well beyond the Bowery and into mainstream culture. Despite this, I have personally seen a new trend of bars opening up in areas, namely the less economically stable areas of New York City, that cater primarily to homosexuals. In these areas, homosexuality is shunned far more harshly than in areas with financial stability. Overall, the foundation that was built at the turn of the century are still being built upon by those of the contemporary age, and are trying to gain more notoriety, further the homosexual identity.
Many young, radical gays and lesbians in the late 60’s joined SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) or a Black liberation organization, rather than NACHO (North American Conference of Homophile Organizations) which “struck them as hopelessly bourgeois.” Others may have steered clear of NACHO because of NACHO’s radical (for that time) stance that homosexuality was neither abnormal nor unnatural. Duberman points out the irony of the centrist organization, NACHO, being willing to take a more radical stance on gay liberation than the gay and lesbian activists themselves (Duberman, 1994).
Life for most homosexuals during the first half of the Twentieth century was one of hiding, being ever so careful to not give away their true feelings and predilections. Although the 1920s saw a brief moment of openness in American society, that was quickly destroyed with the progress of the Cold War, and by default, that of McCarthyism. The homosexuals of the 50s “felt the heavy weight of medical prejudice, police harassment and church condemnation … [and] were not able to challenge these authorities.” They were constantly battered, both physically and emotionally, by the society that surrounded them. The very mention or rumor of one’s homosexuality could lead to the loss of their family, their livelihood and, in some cases, their lives. Geanne Harwood, interviewed on an National Public Radio Broadcast commemorating the twentieth anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, said that “being gay before Stonewall was a very difficult proposition … we felt that in order to survive we had to try to look and act as rugged and as manly as possibly to get by in a society that was really very much against us.” The age of communist threats, and of Joseph McCarthy’s insistence that homosexuals were treacherous, gave credence to the feeling of most society members that homosexuality was a perversion, and that one inflicted was one to not be trusted.
The history of the gay rights movement goes as far back as the late 19th century. More accurately, the quest by gays to search out others like themselves and foster a feeling of identity has been around since then. It is an innovative movement that seeks to change existing norms and gain acceptance within our culture. By 1915, one gay person said that the gay world was a "community, distinctly organized" (Milestones 1991), but kept mostly out of view because of social hostility. According to the Milestones article, after World War II, around 1940, many cities saw their first gay bars open as many homosexuals began to start a networking system. However, their newfound visibility only backfired on them, as in the 1950's president Eisenhower banned gays from holding federal jobs and many state institutions did the same. The lead taken by the federal government encouraged local police forces to harass gay citizens. "Vice officers regularly raided gay bars, sometimes arresting dozens of men and women on a single night" (Milestones). In spite of the adversity, out of the 1950s also came the first organized groups of gays, including leaders. The movement was small at first, but grew exponentially in short periods of time. Spurred on by the civil rights movement in the 1960s, the "homophile" (Milestones) movement took on more visibility, picketing government agencies and discriminatory policies. By 1969, around 50 gay organizations existed in the United States. The most crucial moment in blowing the gay rights movement wide open was on the evening of July 27, 1969, when a group of police raided a gay bar in New York City. This act prompted three days of rioting in the area called the Stonewall Rio...
Halperin, David. "Is There a History of Sexuality?." The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader. Ed. Henry