10 Gay Slang Terms and What They Mean

Contents:

• GAY SLANG
• FROM CLOSET TALK TO PC TERMOLOGY : GAY SPEECH AND THE POLICS OF VISIBILY
• GAY SLANG 101
• THE 'GAY' WORD: WHAT DO MEAN WHEN YOUNG PEOPLE E NEGATIVELY?
• 35 FRENCH GAY SLANG WORDS YOU NEED TO KNOW
• WHAT DO THE ABBREVIATN 'TT' MEAN GAY ADDS?
• HOW TO USE TR DIFFERENTLY FOR GAY
• THE FOTTEN SECRET LANGUAGE OF GAY MEN

GAY SLANG

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

Depuis l’époque où l’homosexualé éta synonyme perversn, voire dél, jqu’x actuell gay pris, la munté gay, lbienne, bisexuelle et transgenre n’a csé développer un langage distctif, le gayspeak.

Milant tout tant que ludique, ce langage se vt également le défensr d’un certa style vie, cherchant à exprimer, manière la pl visible, poliquement rrecte et effice qui so, la richse s portements et s cultur du mon gay. 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.

GAY SLANG 101

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. 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.

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.

THE 'GAY' WORD: WHAT DO MEAN WHEN YOUNG PEOPLE E NEGATIVELY?

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.

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.

35 FRENCH GAY SLANG WORDS YOU NEED TO KNOW

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. Food metaphors are not unmon, such as seafood (gay sailors) and related sailor queens (men whose primary tert is sailors), tuna (young gay sailors), jam (younger men), angel food (gay men the air force), rice queens (men attracted to Asians), ernment spected meat (a gay man the armed forc) to be found meat racks (gay male cisg areas).

Animal imag clu studs (mostly, although not necsarily, Ain-Amerins butch), (kissg) fish (young gay women), bears (hairy and overweight men), and chicken hawks (olr men lookg for younger men). Apts of the Scene (the gay club circu) attend whe parti, where Amy-Johns (after Amazons), lipstick lbians35 (stylishly drsed a tradnally feme way), and chapstick lbians (who do not wear make-up and are very much to sports)36 meet wh leather dyk, tomboys, and lemons (lbians).

WHAT DO THE ABBREVIATN 'TT' MEAN GAY ADDS?

As for gym bunni/queens (gay men who work out a gym), and mcle Mari (more effemate gym queens) who are a h among mcle queens (men who prefer mcular men), they will jo flamers (effemate gay men), baby Crocketts (psdo-wboys), and label queens (signers’ fashn victims)37. 9Probably more self-nscns than provotn, today’s gay lexin not only f an inty different om the norm but also prov the aspiratn of homosexuals to be visible wh a larger straight society. As Julia Stanley ntend 1970 her article « Homosexual Slang »38, was a way to celebrate group bondg through a mon—and dynamic—way of speakg, even though few members of the muny spoke .

The yearly gay pris which take place most Amerin ci, the midst of ribbons, lorful paras, and mil shows, are a clear signal, as the name dite, that there is pri beg members of the « fay », a term the gay muny sometim appli to self39. In the 1970’s, rearch on language and homosexualy likewise beme more foced on how and by whom this specialized lexin was ed, a differentiatn the pre-Stonewall era had hardly promoted.

In this ebullience, Bce Rodger’s landmark The Queen’s Vernacular was released (1972), followed, to mentn jt a few, by Joseph Hay’s « Gayspeak » (1976) and « Language and Language Behavr of Lbian and Gay Men » (1978‑1979), Leonard R. Pl Baker himself, who has nducted terviews among the Brish LGTB populatn, rearched gay archiv and d gay and lbian chats on the ter, released Fantabulosa: A Dictnary of Polari and Gay Slang 200242, wh 1, 700 entri rived om terviews, archiv, and gay and lbian web chats43. The ter has s share, upon which the prent study has been partially based, such as the onle Dictnary of Gay Slang and Historil Terms, Flampeak, Queer Slang the Gay 90, Rebec Stt’s A Brief Dictnary of Queer Slang and Culture (1997), Matt & Andrej Koymasky’s GLTB Slang Dictnary (last updated 2005), and Robert Owen Stt’s prehensive Wizard Gay Slang Dictnary (last updated 2003)44.

HOW TO USE TR DIFFERENTLY FOR GAY

Whereas the 1960s gay and lbian scholars took a stake the polil advancement of homosexuals, directly enuragg the olr generatn to e the Lavenr language, gay youths cid to avoid what they nsired a relic of the past ( England, some claimed Polari to be « silly, femisg and outdated »45).

In the mid-1970s and 1980s, however, the divisns between homosexuals flated, strengtheng the hn of the muny as well as a new approach of homosexualy which was fed terms of opprsed mory inty: after the manner of Ain-Amerins who promoted Black English vernacular, LGBT people found logil to adopt a specific language, although as we noted before, gayspeak has always been more a lexin than a language wh s proper grammatil and phonologil l. Simultaneoly, this new hive attu enuraged the velopment of the morn queer theory movement, part of which attempted to analyze the secreted ntent of the gay and lbian language. Sce the late 1980s, the inty-based mol of homosexualy has been s turn challenged, for beg excsively foced on rpectabily, th excludg some margal liftyl—sadomasochists, workg-class femme lbians, Ain-Amerin drag queens, and bisexuals—wh the gay muny self.

In an effort to reawaken the spir of activism om the post-Stonewall era, Queer Natn adopted a somewhat nontatnal approach and purposely ed the word queer for s shock value while rejectg the term gay, which for some had bee too mastream49. Until Queer Natn reclaimed the term queer, had been ed offensively for an openly homosexual (the semantic shift om « unual » to « unual sexual orientatn » occurred the 1920s).

THE FOTTEN SECRET LANGUAGE OF GAY MEN

First ed to scribe the participants New York drag balls the 1890s, fa(i)ry beme a mon pretg term the 20th century ed to qualify effemate gays ( the mid-1900’s fairy ladi was applied to femme lbians)58.

It was possibly rived om the French fagot, a bundle of sticks and twigs bound together, ed for burng heretics and wch at the stake, or om an abive term for women, or reference to younger boys who performed duti for senrs Brish public schools, where homosexualy was viewed as enmic. « The label ‘homosexual’ », Norton explas, « stead of beg generated by society to ntrol people, was self-generated by gay (or gay-iendly) men to empower dividuals and set them on the road to eedom rather than enslavement »62. The existence of the term lbian probably acunts for such perceptn, as do the ep-rooted belief that homosexualy was mostly a male phenomenon (studi and reprsive legislatns have been mostly about gay men).

Whereas the neteenth century gay signated male and female prostut65, is now advantageoly displayg LGBT flamboyance, wh ls technily than the term homosexual and wh an assuredly ls explic lk between sexual activy and gay inty regardls of the genr66.