BUTCH-FEM (LESBIAN)RELATIONSHIPS 4 into two zones has some validity, but is sexual, emotional and social identities, due to folkways, morality, and economic outside of the relationship. Some butches factors rather than the weather. This essay believe they were born different from other has sometimes been mistaken for a "gay women; others view their identity as so- lib" apology ahead of its time, but a close cially constructed. reading reveals that Burton looked upon While no exact date has yet been sodomy as a lurid vice suitable for shock- established for the start of the usage of the ing Mrs. Grundy when Burton was in a terms "butch" and "fern," oral histories do mischievous mood. There is no proof that show their prevalence from the 1930s on. he ever had sexual relations with any The butch-fem couple was particularly woman (including his wife) or boy, al- dominant in the United States, in both though the visit to the brothels of Karachi blackandwhite lesbian communities, from has naturally led to suspicions that he did the 1920s through the fifties and early more than just look at the catarnites. sixties. The final years of Burton's life Basic Features. Because the com- were spent in Trieste, working on'a mas- plementarity of butch and fem is perceived sive erotic masterpiece which supposedly differently by different women, no simple includedmuchinformationonhomosexu- definition can be offered. When seen ality, information supplied to him by through outsiders' eyes, the butch appears Symonds, Ulrichs, Henry Spencer Ashbee, simplistically "masculine," and the fem, and Guy de Maupassant. However, the "feminine," paralleling heterosexual cate- manuscript was destroyed after Burton's gories. But butches and fems transformed death by his widow as part of her sanctifi- heterosexual elements such as gender atti- cation plans for her husband's memory. tude and dress into a unique lesbian lan- This work was supposedly an annotated guage of sexuality and emotional bonding. translation of the Perfumed Garden of the Butch-fem relationships are based on an Sheikh Nefzawi (or Nafzawi), but the intense erotic attraction with its own ritu- French translation had no references to als of courtship, seduction and offers of pederasty. TheGloryofthe Perfumed Gar- mutual protection. While the erotic con- den is a recent work claiming to be the nection is the basis for the relationship, "missing" half of this work, with chapters and while butches often see themselves as on pederasty and lesbianism, but this may the more aggressive partner, butch-fern be a fraud. relationships, when they work well, de- velop a nurturing balance between two BIBLIOGRAPHY. Stephen W. Foster, different kinds of women, each encourag- "The Annotated Burton," in The Gay Academic, Louie Crew, ed., Palm ing the other's sexual-emotional identity. Springs, California: ETC Publications, Couples often settle into domestic long- 1978, pp. 92-103; Brian Reade, ed., term relationships or engage in serial Sexual Heretics, New York: Coward- monogamy, a practice Kennedy and Davis McCann, 1971. trace back to the thirties, and one they Stephen W.Foster view as a major Lesbian contribution to an alternative for heterosexual marriage. In BUTCH-FEM (LESBIAN) the streets in the fifties, butch-fern couples RELATIONSHIPS were a symbol of women's erotic auton- Butch-fem(me] relationships are omy, a visual statement of a sexual and a style of lesbian loving and self-presenta- emotional accomplishment that did not tion which can in America be traced back include men. to the beginning of the twentieth century; Butch-fem relationships are historical counterparts can be found even complex erotic and social statements, filled earlier. Butches and fems have separate with a language of stance, dress, gesture, 4 BUTCH-FEM [LESBIAN)RELATIONSHIPS and comradeship. Both butches and fems financial and social securities of the hetero- carry with them their own erotic and sexual world, caring for each other in ill- emotional identities, announced in differ- ness and death, in times of economic ent ways. In the fifties, butch women, depression, and in the face of the rampant dressed in slacks and shirts and flashing homophobia of the fifties. Younger butches pinky rings, announced their sexual exper- were often initiated into the community tise in a public style that often opened by older, more experienced women who their lives to ridicule and assault. Many passed on the rituals of expected dress, adopted men's clothes and wore short attitude, and erotic behavior. This sense of "DA" hair cuts to be comfortable and so responsibility to each other stood the that their sexual identity and preference women in good stead when police raided would be clearly visible. As Liz Kennedy their bars or when groups of men threat- and Madeline Davis, authors of a study of ened them on the streets. aworking-class blackand white butch-fem Bars were the social background community inBuffalo, New York, 1940-60, for many working-class butch-fem com- have pointed out, the butch woman took munities and it was in their dimly lit as her main goal in love-making the pleas- interiors that butches and fems could ure she could give her fem partner. This perfect their styles and find each other. In sense of dedication to her lover, rather the fifties, sexual and social tension often than to her own sexual fulfillment, is one erupted into fights and many butches felt of the ways a butch is clearly distinct from they had to be tough to protect themselves the men she is assumed to be imitating. and their women, not just in the bars but The fem woman, who can often on the streets as well. pass as a straight woman when not with Butch-fem is not a monolithic her lover, actively sought to share her life social-sexual category. Within its general with a woman others labeled a freak. Be- outline, class, race, and region give rise to fore androgynous fashions became popu- style variations. In the black lesbian lar, many fems were the breadwinners in community of New York, for instance, their homes because they could get jobs "bull dagger" and "stud" were more com- open to traditional-looking women, but monly used than the word "butch." A fem they confronted the same public scorn would be "my lady" or "my family." Many when appearingin public with their butch women of the lesbian literary world and of lovers. Contrary to gender stereotyping, the upper classes also adopted this style of many fems were and are aggressive, strong self-presentation. In the 1920s, Radclyffe women who take responsibility for ac- Hall, the author of The Well of Loneliness, tively seeking the sexual and social part- called herself John in her marriage to Lady ner they desire. Una Troubridge. Butch-fem style also CommunityAspects. Particularly shows the impact of changing social mod- in the fifties and sixties, the butch-fem els and politics. Feminism, for instance, community became the public face of as well as open relationships and non- lesbianism when its members formed bar monogamy, have been incorporated communities across the country, and thus into butch-fem life of the seventies and became targets of street and police vio- eighties. lence. With the surge of lesbian femi- In earlier decades, butch-fem nism in the early seventies, butch-fem communities were tightly knit, made up women were often ridiculed and ostra- of couples who, in some cases, had long- cized because of their seeming adherence standingrelationships. Exhibiting traits of to heterosexual role playing. In the eight- feminism before the seventies, butch-fem ies, however, a new understanding of the working-class women lived without the historical and sexual-social importance of BYRON, GEORGE GORDON, LORD O butch-fem women and communities has (Spring 19861, 7-28; JonathanKntz, Gay begun to emerge. Controversy still exists American History, New York: Thomas about the value of this lesbian way of Y. Crowell, 1976; Audre Lorde, Zami, Tnunansburg, New York: The Crossing loving and living, however. Members of Press, 1982; Merril Mushroom, "How to such groups as Women Against Pomogra- Engage in Courting Rituals, 1950 Butch phy depict butch-fem as a patriarchal, Style in the Bars: an Essay," Common oppressive, hierarchical way of relating. LiveslLesbian Lives (Summer 1982), The American lesbian community is now 6-10; Joan Nestle, "The Fem Question," in Pleasure and Danger, Carole S. marked by awiderange of relational styles: Vance, ed., Boston: Routledge and Kegan butch-fem is just one of the ways to love, Paul, 1984; idem, A Restricted Country, but the butch-fem community does carry Ithaca: Firebrand Books, 1987; idem, with it the heritage of being the first pub- "An Old Dyke's Tale: An Interview with Doris Lunden," Conditions 6 (1980), licly visible lesbian community. 2644. Related Terms. Joan Nestle "Stone butch": a butch woman who does not allow herself to be touched during lovemaking, but who often experi- BYRON,GEORGE enced orgasm while making love to her GORDON,LORD partner. This was a sexual style prevalent (1788-1824) in the forties and fifties. English Romantic poet, born in "Baby butch": a young-looking London. The most influential poet of his butch woman with a naive face who brings day, with a world-wide reputation, Byron out the maternal as well as sexual longings became famous with the publication of of fem women. Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (18 12-18), an "Kiki": a term used from the for- account of his early travels in Portugal, ties through the sixties for a lesbian who Spain, Albania, and Greece. The proud, could be either butch or fem. A publicly gloomy, guilt-ridden, alienated Harold kiki woman in the forties and fifties was defined the "Byronic hero" who was to often looked upon with suspicion though reappear in various guises in Byron's later in the privacy of butch-fem homes, differ- poems, notably in "Manfred," "The Cor- ent sexual positions were often explored. sair," and "Lara." The type became a de- "Passingwoman": a woman who fining image for European and American works and dresses like a man; this style of romanticism. Forced into exile in 1816 self-presentation was often used in the because of the scandal caused by his wife's past to transcend the gender limitations leaving him, Byron settled in Italy, princi- placed on women. Many working-class pally in Venice. There he wrote his spar- women "passed" in order to hold down the kling satire on cant and hypocrisy, Don jobs they wanted without harassment; in 1 Juan. He spent the last months of his life in earlier decades passing women often mar- Greece, trying to help the Greeks in their ried other women. Passing women have struggle to gain independence from the their own sexual identity. I Turks. (The author wishes to extend Notorious in his lifetime for his special thanks to Deborah Edel, Lee many affairs with women, Byron at 17 fell Hudson, and the New YorkButch Support , in love with a Cambridge college choir Group for help in preparing this article.) boy, John Edleston, two years his junior. This love is expressed in such early poems BIBLIOGRAPHY. Madeline Davis and as E-,u Elizabeth Lopovsky Kennedy, "Oral tq-he comelian,,t and "Stan- Historv and the Studv of Sexualitv in zas to Jessy," but most fully in the "Thyna" the ~eibianCommunity: Buffalo, New elegies written after Edleston's death in York. 1940-1960," Feminist Studies 12 I 1811 and published (in part) with Childe