Learn Polari, the Secret Language of the Gays

Contents:

• A BRIEF HISTORY OF POLARI, GAY ENGLAND’S ONCE-SECRET LGO
• GAY SLANG
• POLAR BEAR: POPULAR GAY TERMS LGBTQ COMMUNY SUBGROUP SLANG POSTER

A BRIEF HISTORY OF POLARI, GAY ENGLAND’S ONCE-SECRET LGO

An olr gay man who has gray hair, a bear, and is of a hefty size.

GAY SLANG

Ually prefers the pany of other "bears" (big gay men) or beg the olr, more experienced partner for a younger, smoother the polar bear mug. But for Brish gay men (and sometim women) the first half of the 20th century, Polari wasn’t jt a cute jargon: It was a secret , one that was absolutely gay Bra before about 50 years ago was dangero bs, and even beg perceived as gay then uld st you a prison sentence (homosexualy was crimalized the UK 1967). In fact, gay culture was discsed so rarely that newspapers would report on gay people who were arrted as beg guilty of "gross cency, " sce was nsired taboo to even wre (or speak) the words "gay" or "homosexual.

POLAR BEAR: POPULAR GAY TERMS LGBTQ COMMUNY SUBGROUP SLANG POSTER

" Gay people therefore need a way to munite about their relatnships (and gossip) whout beg unrstood by eavdroppers. As language profsor Pl Baker of the UK’s Lanster Universy wr his 2002 book Polari—The Lost Language of Gay Men, was a lgo of "fast put-downs, ironic self-parody and theatril exaggeratn. " By other acunts, the roots of Polari are at least partially to be found the lgua an ed by Mederranean sailors and trars the Middle Ag and 's difficult to say when exactly Polari began, but at some pot performers—pecially actors, and pecially gay actors—began to e a distct argot to munite wh each other, often for the purpose of gossipg.

Tra is a gay sex partner. An omi-palone, therefore, is an effemate man, or sometim jt a gay one, while a palone-omi is a lbian.

Beg gay was also no longer crimal, so the need for a private slang dissipated. The cle of Polari was rapid: In his book, Baker wr that "many gay men unr the age of thirty have never heard of . Wh words like "sha, " "tea, " and "kiki" proment queer culture, sometim feels like 's impossible for straights to unrstand gays...

But once upon a time, that was exactly what Brish gays wanted.

Called Polari, the gay slang is posed of back slang, circ slang, and broken Yiddish and Italian. The "secret language" was ed heavily by gays the circ, navy, and theater, and arose out of the need to discs gay matters unr a clever guise, due to homosexual acts beg illegal Bra until the passage of the Sexual Offens Act 1967. Here's some of the amg slang: Basket - the bulge of male genals through clothFantabulos-wonrfulEf - face (backslang) DollyEf - pretty face Chicken - a young guySome Polari words still exist morn gay slang.

As gays began to fight for acceptance and rights, they ma a ncentrated effort to remove the Brish society's one-dimensnal view of all gays as beg overly mpy and effemate.

Check out Atlas Obscura pots out, Polari was a great self-performative outlet for Brish gays to not only exprs themselv but also easily intify and n wh fellow memebers of the queer muny. Gay Slang for an Olr, Hairy, fat gay guy. You are basilly llg them crazy and gay.

Full term is Bi- Polar-Bear when you are llg them gay and crazy. Wild Gay Slang: Fully Explaed. Gay slang origated out of necsy.

Gay men wanted to be able to speak public whout revealg their sexualy, pecially plac and tim of extreme LGBTQ+ persecutn. Th, gay lexin was born.

Over the years, gay slang has evolved, and ’s sometim tough to keep up.

Ah, the bears, one of the olst and largt subgroups of the gay muny.

The gay man who spends every wakg mute at the gym, talkg about how he needs to go to the gym, or how he’s g om the gym.

An credibly tall gay man.

As part of pup play, a form of kk that is beg more popular the gay muny.