Queer tercultural munitn offers the great promise to advance munitn-amilly, culturally, and polilly-not only for sexual and genr mory muni across the globe but for all muni as they grapple wh qutns of inty and difference an creasgly neoliberal and global social world (Yep et al., 2019, p. 2) the troductn to a special issue, "Out of Bounds? Queer Intercultural Communitn," published one of the journals of the Natnal Communitn Associatn 2013, Karma Chávez, the edor, acknowledged that there had been a arth of munitn studi explorg "the tersectns and terplays between the queer and the tercultural" (Chávez, 2013, p. 84). What domated the knowledge productn munitn is the prence of heteronormative studi that exame the liv and experienc of cisgenr people, margalizg other genr inti, lbians, gays, bisexuals, transgenr people, queer, tersex, asexual (LGBTQIA+) (Eguchi & Asante, 2016). Although there have been studi on queer theory and other queer them and outsi the munitn field, the studi may have overlooked the tersectnaly of culture, sexualy, race, and class necsary for unrstandg munitn. Moreover, the studi may have maly been nducted the Global North, where Whe/Wtern iologi of homonormativy remaed the source and standard for queerns (Chávez, 2013;Eguchi & Asante, 201...
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Largely abandoned by middle-class gays, urban parks rema an important refuge for gay migrants an otherwise hostile cy. * gay migrants *
Around one hundred gay men — many of them migrant workers who lived nearby — were stg on the handrails of a rock bridge, lookg down at the artificial lake below; some had brought tradnal moonk and other snacks to share wh iends the moonlight.
At s peak, this muny nsisted of hundreds of queer men, most of them ral-to-urban migrants livg nearby, but also some accintal visors or people who had heard about the park om other gay men or on social to the late 1990s, when male homosexualy was still crimalized and classified as a mental illns Cha, cisg spac — known as “spots, ” “fishg grounds, ” or “floatg grounds” — were important settgs for urban gay men to meet and get to know each other through agreed-upon s that would not publicly reveal one’s over the past few s, as smopolan nsumer spac and gay bars have sprouted up across urban areas, the act of cisg public parks has shifted om beg a shared secret to an outdated practice — one that embodi the shame and danger associated wh homosexualy earlier rultg emergence of a nsumptn-based gay inty has promoted gay visibily and improved public perceptn of the gay muny. But has also facilated a dichotomy between “good” and “bad” homosexuals, where supposedly cent homosexual sire is rtricted to private spac and visible ditns of homosexualy are nsired cent and associated wh sexually transmted diseas. This stereotype has been ternalized: On foms and social media domated by middle-class gays, public cisg s are universally picted as unsafe, unhygienic, and promiscuo; those who equent them are stigmatized as dulgent and stigmas ter most middle-class gay men om equentg cisg s.
And sce many of them live factory dormori, even if they do succsfully match wh someone, they nnot simply ve them this environment, cisg parks rema one of the few plac where gay migrants n meet and socialize wh each other. Primarily prised of self-scribed “sissy” migrant workers, drag queens, or trans women — the outsts of the urban gay scene — they go to lgh, gossip, and meet up wh people they relate there are the straight-actg and discreet cisers, many of them lol elrly men, lookg for sual sex.