From Closet Talk to PC Termology : Gay Speech and the Polics of Visibily

Contents:

• PCHER (GAY)
• PITCHER T-SHIRT / GAY SLANG T-SHIRT
• PCHER GAY STICKERS
• FROM CLOSET TALK TO PC TERMOLOGY : GAY SPEECH AND THE POLICS OF VISIBILY
• WHAT DO PCHER MEAN A GAY RELATNSHIP?

PCHER (GAY)

GLAAD prefers that we don’t e the term homosexual bee ’s “aggrsively ed by anti-gay extremists to suggt that gay people are somehow diseased or psychologilly/emotnally disorred. In his current rearch, Leap is lookg at Harleme, the language of the Harlem Renaissance, where he c a rich and dynamic queer prence and a manner of speakg that, while beg not exclively queer, has fluenced both gay and mastream language to this day.

Around the same time, Bra, Polari, what scholars ll an anti-language, was at s peak among gay men, but the jargon would be pletely unregnizable to most English speakers today. In the early 1990s, Baker stumbled upon Polari while lookg for a this topic and soon found himself a gay-n hotel Brighton where the nkeepers relled some phraseology. She-g appears almost universally and across centuri gay language, om Pe to the Philipp to South Ai (where gay slang is lled Gayle), to Israel (lled oxtch, rived om an Arabic word meang "my sister"), to Soviet-era Rsia.

But Put's Rsia, where the environment remas extremely hostile for LGBT people, the webse, acrdg to a paper by rearcher Stephan Nance, lists a urse on how to speak prent-day Rsian gay, a slang lled goluboy -- om a word related to the bluish lor of a dove -- prumably to help gay Rsians intify one another. ") Denis Provencher, partment head of French and Italian at the Universy of Arizona, has yet to intify a siar argot as Polari or rearch to gay-specific slang French, where disurse, typil French fashn, operat as more waltz than stri. " While vobulary might be the most fun part of lavenr lguistics for the layperson, scholars are ncerned wh aspects such as tone, flectn, and gturg, as well as the polil and cultural implitns of language -- how the prs wre about LGBT issu, for example, or how queer people munite wh each other privately and at work, or how gay language is learned.

PITCHER T-SHIRT / GAY SLANG T-SHIRT

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This paper exam the extraordary plexy of sexual orientatns and subcultur as exprsed by “gay speech, ” an idm the lbian, gay, bisexual, and transgenr muny has veloped for self. Sce the tim when homosexualy was a perversn to today’s vibrant Pris, gayspeak has been ed to exprs the needs of a group which, feelg socially reprsed, revented and subverted language. 2Funny and provotive as may seem, this msage posted on Kks & Queens, a gay Swedish webse, not only reveals a visibily and culture that the Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgenr muny was long pelled to hh, but also nfirms the existence of a lexin not que like standard English.

PCHER GAY STICKERS

From the darker ag when homosexualy was at s bt a s and/or a perversn until the prent environment of rabow flags and gay pris, gayspeak has been ed to transgrs social norms, articulate particular needs and emotns, as well as renstct, or re-terpret, realy. Givg voice to new perceptns of genr inty while reclaimg offensive terms and a liftyle of their own, gayspeakers are liberately assertg cultural and, to some extent, ant ambns.

When to elaborate polilly rrect fns of the « queer » universe, pk talk displays an extraordary plexy of sexual orientatns and subcultur, a possible means to pensate for lguistic ficiency and to claim a gay space on the social spectm. Most male homosexuals therefore kept their sexual orientatns very much the closet unls amidst their k when they lled each other female nam—« Miss Kten », « Cha Mary », « Primrose Mary », and « Dip-Candle Mary »3—, a practice still faiar among ntemporary gay men. Until World War Two, rearch on what was then labeled the « language of homosexualy » foced on genr versn, wh homosexualy beg regard as a pathology characterized as sexual viance or perversn: whereas heterosexual language equated wh the appropriate genr, homosexual language displayed equent aquaci between the physil genr and the lguistic genr of the speaker.

FROM CLOSET TALK TO PC TERMOLOGY : GAY SPEECH AND THE POLICS OF VISIBILY

In the reprsive and secury-ncerned Cold War environment4, to talk about themselv, most gays and lbians relied upon phemisms such as « iends of Dorothy(‘s) », (after The Wizard of Oz, 1939, a classic mil popular wh gay dienc), « whoopsi », « (s)he’s is a ltle... Dpe the achievements of gay rights, the stigma attached to a « love that dare not [always] speak s name », to quote Osr Wil, ocsnally lgers the way some gays e « them » to refer to their partners and « refully word speech to hi explic genr referenc »16. For many Lbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgenr—or LGBT17—people today, pk talk works as a hive force agast discrimatn, although they also adm that gay exprsns have actually shifted om the physil nfement of the 18th century molly ho to a lguistic nfement.

5Sce 1993 [, ] the Amerin Universy Washgton DC has been home to annual nferenc on Lavenr Language and Lguistics, wh Lavenr19 Language beg fed as the way « lbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgenred persons and queers e language everyday life »20. Acrdg to Bill Leap, the -ordator of the 2003 nference, homosexuals munite wh each other ways that are « different om the lguistic practic of non-lbian/gay-intified persons »21.

WHAT DO PCHER MEAN A GAY RELATNSHIP?

Maclan English dictnary explas that « Lavenr language functns as a kd of homosexual , characterized by acronyms, plays on words and double meangs only tend to be unrstood by the gay muny »22. Leap mentned two other « betiful exampl »: whereas gay speech « pcher » intifi the sexually active dividual and « tcher » the receptive person, « If we say pcher or we say tcher, an ordary nversatn, I thk ’s unlikely that [straight people] would read anythg else to . 6Conceived to exprs the needs of a socially reprsed group, Polari was also, as Profsor Baker explas, « a form of humour and mp25 performance, … a way of iatg people to the gay or theatre subculture »26.

Polari was never signed to pe notice, but was often nontative: ‘Even when travellg the sgular, we weren’t averse to shriekg a quick get you, girl at some menacg naff27… We flnted our homosexualy. 7Apart om a specific lexin, gayspeak reveals self every time qualifiers like « adorable », « fab(ulo) », « glam(oro) », and « so cute », are employed by both gay men and women.

Whereas some lbians tend to speak at a lower pch than straight women—and their range of pch is lser than that of straight women29—the typil high pched disurse and adorned talks of some gay men, not necsarily of the effemate type, is another equent give-away.