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Introduction

DIANE RICHARDSON AND STEVEN SEIDMAN

The academic study of and almost all of these theories define the sexuality in general has ‘taken off’ in many homosexual as a separate human or person- Western nations. Today, students in many ality type. By the mid-twentieth century in nations across the globe have an opportunity many Anglo-American and European to take courses in sexuality, lesbian and gay nations, the idea was well established that studies, or . the homosexual was an abnormal or deviant Lesbian and gay studies have produced a and dangerous type of person. body of research and theorizing that is There were some dissenters. For example, already too extensive and specialized to in England Edward Carpenter imagined comprehensively present. In this volume, homosexuals as a distinct and superior we aim to provide readers with an overview moral-spiritual human type. Somewhat of the field. We make no claim to have later, the American sexologist Alfred Kinsey covered all the possible areas of research shocked his readers by claiming to demon- and theory. Our approach is frankly tilted strate, on the basis of thousands of inter- towards sociology, though feminist, cultural views, that homosexuality is common studies, and queer perspectives are in strong among Americans. He argued that homosex- evidence. In each chapter, authors have uality is less a fixed identity then a general made an effort to present a clear overview of human desire. Nevertheless, in the United the state of the research in a particular field, States and elsewhere, a psychiatric view of the key debates and positions, and to suggest the homosexual as an abnormal human type future directions of possible research and had gained considerable social influence theorizing. during the post-World War II period. The 1950s were a time of heightened discrimination and harassment of homo- HISTORY AND THEORY sexuals. In response to increasing gay visibil- ity, the state and other institutions sought to criminalize and repress homosexuality. Before there developed a sociology of homo- Homosexuals responded by organizing to sexuality, there were medical-scientific advocate tolerance and homosexual rights. theories. These initially appeared over a For example, in the , the century ago, but medical models of homo- Daughters of Bilitis and the Mattachine sexuality have achieved considerable social Society established chapters in major cities influence. They propose various ways of across . In Britain also, organiza- understanding homosexuality, for example, tions emerged such as the Homosexual Law as an inherited or learned identity or as a Reform Society founded in 1958 and, a few form of sexual or gender deviance. Still, years later, the London-based lesbian Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 2

2 Handbook of Lesbian and Gay Studies

organizations Kenric and Minorities was a social problem but a social response to Research Group, which had similar goals to intolerance and prejudice. the Daughters of Bilitis. Members were There were, however, limits to this devel- divided between essentially two political oping social understanding of homosexual- strategies. On the one hand, some sought to ity. For the most part, sociologists and gay decriminalize homosexuality by arguing and women’s liberationists did not question that, as a psychiatric disorder, homosexuals why it was that society defined people in deserve treatment not punishment. On the sexual terms and why sexuality had become other hand, some aimed to reverse the medi- an identity. They assumed that there had cal model by claiming that homosexuals always been homosexuals and heterosexu- were normal people like heterosexuals. At als; only the social response varied in differ- the same time, there also appeared the ent societies. beginnings of a sociological approach – the The 1980s were an important period in homosexual was seen as a victimized social gay life. In the USA, the UK, Denmark, minority. Holland, France, Australia, and elsewhere, A big change in Western ideas of homo- social movements were creating public sexuality came in the 1960s and 1970s. The lesbian and gay communities. In virtually women’s and gay liberation movements every major city, gays were creating institu- proposed a view of homosexuality as a tions, organizations, clubs, support groups, social and political identity. For example, and beginning to gain political clout. some lesbians argued that being a lesbian is Despite a great deal of opposition, the gay a political act that challenges both the norm movement was making great strides towards of heterosexuality and men’s dominance. To gaining rights and respect. This period of be a lesbian is to choose to live a life apart social and political advancement also wit- from men and to make women the center of nessed the rise of ‘social constructionist’ one’s personal and social life. perspectives in lesbian and gay studies. Social scientists were also beginning to Although constructionists learned from develop a social approach to sexuality. earlier social approaches by sociologists, Some sociologists approached homosexual- feminists and others, a new wave of thinkers ity as neither normal or abnormal, but con- and researchers sought to deepen a social sidered the way homosexuals created their view of homosexuality. Constructionists own identities and subcultures in a hostile argued that sex was fundamentally social; society. In the USA and England, the label- the modern categories of sexuality, most ing theory of Howard Becker (1963), Edwin importantly, heterosexuality and homosexual- Schur (1965), and Ken Plummer (1975) and ity, but also the whole system of modern the ‘sexual script’ approach of John Gagnon sexual types and notions of normal and and William Simon (1973) emphasized that abnormal sexualities, were understood as while individuals may be born with or social and historical facts. develop in infancy homosexual feelings, In particular, constructionist perspectives they have to learn to think of these feelings challenged the notion that homosexuals as an identity and to manage this identity in have always existed. This idea was popular an unfriendly society. in the gay movement. If homosexuals have In the mid-1970s, the writings of socio- always existed, then it would seem that logists, along with the ideas of gays and homosexuality is natural and homosexuals feminists, contributed to developing a socio- should be accepted. By contrast, construc- logical perspective. The meaning and social tionists proposed that while homosexual role of homosexuality were determined by feelings or desires may have always existed, the way people respond to it. This social ‘homosexuals’, viewed as a distinct identity, view became politically important, as it sug- have appeared only in some societies. The gested that it was not homosexuality which French social thinker, Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 3

Introduction 3

(1980) provided a powerful statement of this too male-oriented, white, middle-class and perspective. too narrowly focused on rights and social acceptance. As defined by ancient civil or canonical codes, In a social environment where gays sodomy was a category of forbidden acts; their perpetrator was nothing more than the juridical were embroiled in battles within and outside subject of them. The nineteenth-century homo- the gay and feminist movements, there sexual became a personage, a past, a case history, appeared a new intellectual and political a life form … Nothing that went into total current: queer theory. Queer theory chal- composition was unaffected by his sexuality. It lenged a key idea of gay thinking and poli- was everywhere present in him: at the root of all tics: the notion that all homosexuals share a his actions … because it was a secret that always gave itself away. common core of experience, interests, and way of life. By contrast, queer theorists Scholars such as Jeffrey Weeks (1977), argue that there are many ways of being gay. Jonathan Katz (1976), Carroll Smith- Specifically, sexual identity cannot be sepa- Rosenberg (1985) and Randolph Trumbach rated from other identities such as race, (1977) similarly proposed the thesis of the class, nationality, gender, or age. Any specific social construction of ‘the homosexual’. definition of homosexual identity is restric- Armed with this new approach to sexuality, tive. For example, to claim that homosexuals constructionists have sought to explain the are the same as heterosexuals or are promis- origin, social meaning, and changing forms cuous, gender playful, or campy, applies to of the modern homosexual (e.g., D’Emilio, some individuals but not to others. More- 1983; Faderman, 1981). Scholars have over, when a particular idea of being gay debated when the notion of ‘the homosexual’ becomes dominant or an ideal, it devalues or initially appeared, what social factors excludes those who deviate. For example, if account for this development and the differ- we read many Western publications we ent historical emergence of the category might think that most gay men aspire to an ‘lesbian’, what kinds of subcultures or ideal of beauty that includes being muscu- networks have sustained a homosexual lar, hairless, slim, short-haired, abled, and identity, and how societies have responded white. This ideal devalues and marginalizes to these developments. gay men who do not exhibit these features. The 1990s witnessed huge changes in the Approaching identities as multiple and social and political status of lesbians and regulatory may suggest to critics the under- gay men in many Western nations. Unprece- mining of gay theory and politics, but, for dented social integration occurred, includ- queer thinkers and activists, it presents new ing the right to marry in Denmark, , and productive possibilities. Queers do not Sweden, and most recently Holland. But wish to abandon identity but to recognize these changes did not amount to a steady and value the multiplicity of meanings that line of progress. There was a powerful anti- are attached to being gay or lesbian. This gay backlash. In the USA, gay rights laws encourages a culture and movement where were overturned, a made many voices and interests are heard and anti-gay politics into the center of its social shape gay life and politics. While it might activism, and anti-gay violence spread. This make gay politics messy, it will bring more backlash, along with the AIDS crisis, people into the movement and make possi- prompted a renewal of radical activism. In ble varied political strategies. addition, deep internal conflicts within both Queer perspectives also aim to shift the feminist and gay movements surfaced, prov- focus of analysis and politics away from ing at once divisive and productive. In par- thinking of gays as a separate group or a ticular, women, people of color, bisexuals, minority. Instead, queers focus on a system and transgendered peoples criticized the of sexuality that constructs the self as movement for promoting an agenda that was sexual, that assigns a master sexual identity Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 4

4 Handbook of Lesbian and Gay Studies

as heterosexual or homosexual to all citizens, medical view of the homosexual as an and regulates everyone’s sexuality in terms abnormal psychological type gained wide of a norm of sexual normality. Queers aim, popularity through public scandals or court then, to broaden sexual theory into a general trials such as that of Oscar Wilde in England. critical study of sexualities and to expand While the two British sociologists offered politics beyond identity politics to a focus broad social and historical approaches to on the norms and regulations that control homosexual identity, other sociologists were everyone’s sexuality. Queer politics is less researching the microsocial dynamics of about legitimating minority sexual identities identity formation. In particular, the labeling than widening the sphere of sexual and approach understood sexual identity as intimate life freed from state and institu- learned through processes of social inter- tional control. action. For example, Plummer (1975) argued that individuals are not born homosexual, but become homosexual. They have to learn to IDENTITY AND COMMUNITY define their desires as signs of a homosexual identity and they often rely on the support of other homosexuals to accept this identity and For much of this century, homosexuality to come out. Moreover, while some homo- was seen as a natural, biologically based sexuals stay isolated, others respond to condition. People were said to be born het- stereotypes by coming out. Some individuals erosexual or homosexual. Homosexuals become part of subcultures and social move- were assumed to have existed throughout ments that provide a positive sense of iden- history, although societies responded differ- tity, a sense of social belonging, and a social ently, some mildly tolerating, others aggres- basis to mobilize for rights and respect. sively hostile. The sociology of sexual identity has This perspective was first challenged by developed in two directions from the 1980s the British sociologist, Mary McIntosh to the present. On the one hand, there has (1968). She approached homosexuality as a been an emphasis on the multiple types of social role. She asked, why have some homosexual identities. Sociologists and societies developed the idea that homosexu- others point out that individuals are not just ality is an identity? McIntosh suggested that heterosexual or homosexual but these sexual some societies establish a homosexual role in identities are shaped by factors such as order to create boundaries between accept- gender, class, race, and nationality. Indivi- able and nonacceptable behaviors. By defin- duals never experience being gay in a general ing the homosexual as an unnatural or way, but only in specific and varied ways, stigmatized identity, heterosexuality is made for example, as a white, middle-class lesbian into the norm and ideal. Good, respectable or a disabled, Korean gay man. Thus, femi- citizens are then expected to be heterosexual. nists have argued that men and women McIntosh held that while many societies experience being gay differently because, are intolerant of homosexuality, only some while men are socially dominant, women societies create a homosexual identity. She are, in most societies, socially subordinate. did not, however, research where, when, and Accordingly, being a lesbian means not only how such homosexual identities were cre- desiring women but also (usually) living ated. It was her colleague, among others, independently of men. Being a lesbian, then, Jeffrey Weeks (1977) who proposed that it challenges a male dominant social order in a was in late nineteenth-century that way that is not true for gay men. This per- the idea of a distinct homosexual identity spective suggests a sociology of homosexual first developed. Weeks emphasized the role identities that views gay lives as enmeshed of medical and scientific ideas in creating the in social dynamics of class, race, gender, notion of a homosexual type of person. The nationality, and so on. Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 5

Introduction 5

On the other hand, queer approaches to were bars, baths, house parties, clubs, balls, identity emphasize the fluid, performative and cruising areas where individuals formed character of identities. Identities are not relationships and developed feelings of learned and then fixed. Rather, identities are community. In many cases, these places produced through behaviors that project a mixed straight and gay people. For example, particular identity. The key point here is that Chauncey (1994) documents a gay world in actions produce the notion of sexual iden- in the early 1900s where tity, rather than understanding behavior as straight and gays or in his terms ‘normal’ an expression of a core psychological iden- men and ‘fairies’ mixed regularly – in tity. For example, lesbians may signal that restaurants, speakeasies and bars. In they are gay by the things they say, the way Harlem, rent parties provided occasions for they look at women, by wearing certain gay people to meet and party. These social clothes, or using certain words that are networks made it possible for individuals to socially recognized as indicating a lesbian fashion positive identities and to find part- identity. Although many of us might think ners and social support. that these practices express a core identity, In the post-war period, these loosely queers argue that they project an identity formed social networks became solidly that is then taken as a psychological core. institutionalized. Throughout the 1950s and Homosexual identities are then a product 1960s, in most European and Anglo- of the social environment. Individuals are American nations, there were social organi- not born homosexuals, nor do they naturally zations and institutions such as bars or clubs grow up becoming aware that this is who that were frequented by gay people. For they are. Instead, they must learn to think of example, historians have documented the themselves as homosexual. Whether they development of a public working-class do and how they do depend on the social lesbian culture in many American cities that environment. was organized around butch–fem roles. Of Initially, the notion of a homosexual iden- course, it was precisely this publicness that tity was created by medical, scientific ideas. made lesbians and gay men easy targets of As we saw, the homosexual was defined as harassment and sometimes arrest. an inferior, abnormal human type. Gradu- The major breakthrough in the evolution ally, these ideas were accepted by other of gay communities accompanied the take- social institutions such as the criminal off of a lesbian and gay movement in the justice system and the government. Homo- 1970s and 1980s. A national movement for sexuals have not, however, simply accepted gay rights and liberation stimulated a these stigmatized identities. They have remarkable period of community building. resisted by challenging a medical model, for In small and large towns and cities across example, by affirming their identity as nations such as the USA, England, Australia, normal, natural, or good. Gays have sought Holland, Denmark, and France, lesbian to change their legal and social status, and and gay community centers, bars, social sometimes to change society. clubs, and political organizations become Sociologists make the point that in order commonplace. The institutionalization of for individuals to challenge a stigmatized gay subcultures made being gay into a identity, they need social support. Although profoundly social identity – indicating not lesbian and gay individuals have often been only an individual desire but also member- isolated, they have also formed social net- ship of a complex, dense social world of works or communities. institutions, organizations, and social and In the early part of the twentieth century, political events. lesbians and gay men relied mostly on infor- Gay institutions were initially formed as mal friendship networks. However, even safe havens from a hostile world. They before the movements in the 1970s, there provided a positive sense of identity and Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 6

6 Handbook of Lesbian and Gay Studies

community. They were often to be found continuum (Fuss, 1990). A common view, exclusively in major urban centers. Partici- however, and one which developed through pation in gay subcultures often meant feel- the late nineteenth century and was pro- ing a strong sense of isolation from the foundly influential during the twentieth social mainstream. century, is that sex is determined by biology The role of the gay community has and not by society. changed somewhat. As gays have gained Theories that seek to establish ‘natural’ or rights and achieved considerable social inte- ‘biological’ explanations for our sexual gration, two developments are noteworthy. practices, relationships and identities, gener- First, more and more individuals today ally referred to as essentialist, contain within choose to participate in these gay subcul- them the assumption that sexuality is funda- tures less for reasons of escaping social mentally pre-social. Sex is understood in disapproval or hostility than because terms of a powerful instinct or drive, usually they affirm one’s identity and provide a assumed to be stronger in men than women, desired way of life. In major urban areas which is a product of our biological make- such as London, Amsterdam, New York, up as human beings. Sexuality, in this model, , Sydney, or Copenhagen, all is regarded as separate to society and ‘the highly tolerant and sexually integrated social’. social spaces, it is possible for individuals to In accepting this sex/society split, many organize a rich individual and social life theorists have assumed sex to be not only around being gay. presocial, but also antisocial. Sex is defined Second, it is no longer credible to think of as a natural energy or force that is outside of the urban gay community as the heart and and opposed to society, which needs to be soul or the model of gay community life. held in check in order to maintain social Gay networks and institutions are to be order. This ‘repressive hypothesis’ assumes found in virtually every city, small or large, that modern societies depend upon a high and many suburbs. Furthermore, there are level of sexual repression. Social institutions now a multiplicity of types of communities, are here associated with constraint and from politically oriented ones to social clubs control over people’s sexual lives and, organized around a specific interest such as importantly, are seen to depend upon sexual religion, art, sexual preference, or age, to repression for their continued existence. fairly dense social networks that are sus- Indeed, the release of sexual energy from tained by friendships and social events. such constraints would, it is hypothesized, threaten or destroy modern ‘civilization’ and the social institutions upon which it is INSTITUTIONS founded. For this reason some writers believed that sexuality had the power to transform society. Liberationist writers such In contemporary western societies sexuality as Marcuse (1970) and Reich (1962), for is commonly understood as being a personal example, drawing on Marxism and the work and private matter, linked to the body, the of Freudian psychoanalysis, argued for the individual and concepts of nature. Indeed, need for greater sexual freedom and expres- sex is often talked about as if it had a certain sion as a prerequisite to radical social mysterious quality, encompassing desires, reform. feelings and motives that we cannot easily These traditional assumptions about sexu- explain, an area of our lives somehow ality, which have their roots in sociology, set apart from the public world and the anthropology, psychoanalysis, and past workings of society. There are, of course, medical investigations of sex, help us to many different theoretical approaches to sex- begin to understand how we think about sex- uality along the essentialist–constructionist uality in relation to social institutions. How Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 7

Introduction 7

and in what ways are sexual lives ‘controlled’ assumptions about sexuality. The main and ‘regulated’? What are the social institu- project, according to writers such as Warner tions that are key to shaping sexualities in (1993), is the queering of existing theory contemporary societies? rather the production of theory about queers. There has been a good deal of work in This is the point Eve Sedgwick makes in lesbian and gay studies on the social regula- proposing that: tion of sexuality and how this varies with many of the major modes of thought and know- the changing role of the state, the signifi- ledge in twentieth century western culture as a cance of religion and the law, education, whole are structured by a chronic now endemic health and welfare policies, and so on. crisis of homo/heterosexual definition … an Moreover, the idea that society controls sex- understanding of virtually any aspect of modern uality through repression has been super- western culture must be not merely incomplete seded by the Foucauldian view that but damaged in its central substance to the degree sexuality is regulated not through prohibi- that it does not incorporate a critical analysis of modern homo/heterosexual definition. (1990: 1) tion, but is socially produced through defi- nition and categorization. One of the key This new wave of lesbian and gay studies themes to emerge from such work is the overlaps with earlier feminist work on the changing nature of state and institutional construction of heterosexuality as naturalized control. As Foucault (1980), Weeks (1990) and normalized (Richardson, 1996, 2000a). and others have documented, since the nine- In their ground-breaking work writers like teenth century there have been a number of Adrienne Rich (1980) and Monique Wittig major shifts in the impact that various social (1979) analysed heterosexuality as a social institutions have on people’s sexual lives. institution, as distinct from identity or prac- The declining significance of religion as the tice. Marriage, with its specific understand- authoritative voice on sexuality as medicine ing of distinct roles for women and men, is and scientific views on sexuality became the the institutionalized model of ‘acceptable’ dominant discourse, coupled with the sexuality necessary for social cohesion and increasing secularization of society, has stability, and for social inclusion as indivi- been reflected in a move away from moral duals with full citizenship rights. regulation of sexuality through organized Although the parallels and interconnec- religion to social control being increasingly tions between feminist and queer theory are exercised through medicine, education, and not always sufficiently acknowledged, in social policy. both cases sexuality, specifically the hetero/ In addition to analyses that have focused homosexual binary, is conceptualized as on the role of social institutions in the social something that is encoded in a wide range of regulation and production of sexualities, social institutions and practices. The empha- some lesbian and gay studies have asked the sis is on the relationship between sexuality question in reverse. How do assumptions and social theory; on rethinking the social, on about sexuality inform and constitute social asking what happens to conceptual frame- institutions and our notions of the ‘social works if heteronormative assumptions are world’? This represents a significant develop- challenged. How might these kinds of lesbian ment. Although lesbian and gay studies and gay, feminist and queer, studies inform continue to develop existing notions of sex- our understanding of, for example, health, uality and gender, and to document lesbian education, organized religion, the law, labour and gay lives and political struggles, there is market analysis, or political economy? How an increasing focus on the broader implica- might they contest the meanings of ‘family’, tions of such interventions. For example, a ‘the state’, ‘rights’, ‘public and private’, shift from simply asking how the state treats ‘citizenship’, and ‘the social’? lesbians and gays, to asking how concepts Lesbian and gay studies have, then, con- of the state are themselves grounded in tributed to our understanding of the social Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 8

8 Handbook of Lesbian and Gay Studies

regulation and subjective meanings of lesbians and gays in particular. And the sexuality produced through social institutions language it spoke was that of liberation, of and cultural practices such as, for example, revolution, of political organizing, of the law and religion, media, and education. mobilization. More recently, they have also ventured into In the 1990s a new queer perspective on areas not normally thought of as connected sexuality and sexual politics emerged which with sexuality in an attempt to rethink ‘the echoed many of the concerns of lesbian/ social’. Part of the problem in doing such feminists and gay liberationists before it. work is the tendency to assume that we know Queer politics aims to be transgressive of what concepts such as ‘social’ and ‘sexual’ social norms, of heteronormativity. It is not mean. As we have pointed out, traditionally, about seeking social inclusion, but nor these have been theorized as separate if does it want to remain on the margins. What related spheres. This is hardly surprising. queers seek to do is contest the ways in After all, laws, social policy, the economy – which the hetero/homo binary serves to these are all constituted as belonging to the define heterosexuality at ‘the center’, with public arena, whereas sexuality has tradition- homosexuality positioned as the marginal- ally been associated with the private. And ized ‘other’, by claiming this space. In so despite critiques from feminist writers in par- doing, the notion of sexual ‘difference’ is ticular, the public and the private continue to disrupted, for with no center who or what be thought of as if they were dichotomous. It can one be defined as different to? is this articulation of new ways of thinking Interestingly, alongside the development about sexuality and the interrelationship with of queer there has been a turn to reformist social institutions and practices that is one of politics and agendas, and the rise of what the exciting areas for the future development some have referred to as ‘gay conservatism’ of lesbian and gay studies. in both the USA and the UK. Books like ’s (1993) A Place at the Table and ’s (1996) Virtually POLITICS Normal, for example, articulated a gay (predominantly male) agenda that aims to deradicalize political perspectives on homo- Over the last half century lesbians and gay sexuality, arguing for assimilation in to men have formed groups and organizations mainstream society with the enduring that either implicitly or explicitly have been centrality of marriage and ‘family values’. a basis for political action and engagement. The demands are for acceptance of sexual After World War II in Europe and the USA diversity, rather than a more fundamental a number of ‘homophile’ organizations were questioning of the social conditions that formed in urban centres such as Los produce gendered and sexual divisions. Angeles, San Francisco, and London. These The concept of citizenship, along with organizations were, on the whole, conserva- questions of social exclusion and member- tive in their demands and moderate in their ship, also (re-)emerged during the 1990s as outlook, embracing the political strategies of one of the key areas of debate within both a minority group seeking tolerance from the political discourse and the social sciences. heterosexual majority. By the late 1960s, This focus on citizenship has been reflected however, all this was to change. Liberal in the political language and goals of social acceptance by mainstream society, and the movements concerned with sexuality. This social and legal reforms sought by most has been most obvious in the USA, where lesbian and gay activists a decade earlier, ‘equal rights’ approaches have come to were replaced by a more militant and radical dominate lesbian and gay politics, and is lesbian and gay voice that was highly critical increasingly the ‘main story’ in the UK and of society in general and the way it treated elsewhere in Europe. Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 9

Introduction 9

By the 1990s notions of equality had involves winning support from outside one’s expanded to encompass not just the rights of community. (2000: 50) individuals (identity and conduct-related The AIDS epidemic has been significant in rights), but those of family units and inti- this shift in gay politics, bringing into sharp mate relationship-based claims such as part- relief the lack of legal recognition for non- nership recognition, marriage, parenting heterosexual relationships, with conse- rights including access to adoption, foster- quences for access to pensions, housing, ing and custody rights. Although, despite inheritance and other rights, as well as the this shift, it is important to recognize that need for health and social care services that demands for individual rights have not dis- are accepting of, and appropriate to, lesbian appeared, campaigns for, for example, and gay relationships. Other specific con- unequal age of consent, employment rights, cerns have also fuelled this re-thinking of gays in the military, and hate crime, con- lesbian and gay struggles such as, for exam- tinue to reflect a concern with conduct and ple, Section 28 which Weeks (1991) argues, identity issues (Richardson, 2000b). mobilized and politicized many non- These moves towards a politics of citi- heterosexual communities, especially in its zenship, both in terms of demands for civic attempts to exclude lesbians and gay men rights and rights as consumers, represent a from what is thought to constitute ‘a family’. significant shift in the meaning and focus of On the one hand, it is understandable why sexual politics. It reflects a political agenda ‘family’ and ‘marriage rights’ are important that is a far cry from both the queer politics to lesbians and gay men in their pursuit of of the 1990s and the women’s and gay full citizenship, in so far as it has a number movements that flourished in the late 1960s, of material consequences such as access to and 1970s, with their demands for radical housing, health care, parenting rights, tax social change. The political goal of such and inheritance rights, etc. However, this movements was not to assimilate into, or raises a much broader question, in terms of even to seek to reform the existing the wider implications of such trends, par- sexual/social order, but to challenge and ticularly for lesbian/feminist theory and transform it. politics which have developed powerful John D’Emilio (2000), reflecting on these critiques of heterosexuality, marriage and the changes in lesbian and gay movements over family. (Though it is the case that feminists the past fifty years, characterizes this shift have drawn on the language of citizenship, as a move from an outlook captured by the employing rights language in demands for phrase ‘here we are’, towards activism sexual and reproductive self-determination about family, school, and work which puts for instance.) In effect, we are witnessing a forward a different demand: ‘we want in’. normalization process; a gentrification From this perspective, equality entails process, if you like, of sexual ‘others’. What ‘equalizing up’ within a multicultural model better way to normalize lesbian and gay men of sexual difference. According to D’Emilio, than by marriage and family life? The move this process. is towards making lesbian and gay sexuali- will not be best served by primary emphasis on ties respectable, rather than making being coming out and building community. Access to anti-gay immoral or unrespectable. and equity within the key structures of American In this ‘new deal’ where demands are life will instead require that winning allies centered upon public recognition of lesbian becomes a priority … As for community build- and gay relationships as well as identities, ing, it can in serious ways work counter to what, we might ask, are the kind of obliga- achieving success in other areas. Community building easily becomes insular and separatist. It tions that are concomitant on the recognition can unwittingly foster an isolation and marginali- of such rights by states or supra-states? zation that runs counter to the imperative of What is the ‘deal’ based upon in modern, political engagement, particularly of the sort that liberal, states? Martha Nussbaum, writing Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 10

10 Handbook of Lesbian and Gay Studies

on the theme of sex and social justice, sexuality. It is not simply a case of whether provides some illumination: we are able to reach agreement on particular rights claims or not, though such debates The denial of marriage rights to same-sex couples can be just as contentious, but whether the has socially undesirable consequences … if gays cannot legally get married, their efforts to live in models of citizenship operating, and the the- stable committed partnerships are discouraged, oretical arguments put forward for them, are and a life of rootless or even promiscuous non- compatible with the kind of frameworks that commitment is positively encouraged. Thus a have been used by lesbians and gays/femi- form of discrimination that has its roots in a stereo- nists/and queers in developing a politics of type may cause the stereotype to become, in some gender and sexuality. To further illustrate measure, true. But this state of affairs is irrational: this point, we might consider the recent shift Society has strong reasons to encourage the for- mation of stable domestic units by both hetero- towards a focus on relationship-based rights sexual and homosexual couples. (1999: 202) claims by lesbian and gay movements and campaigning groups, both in the USA and One might say that there is a convergence Europe. As a number of feminist writers happening between gay politics and state such as, for example, Christine Delphy practice in relation to attempts to maintain (1996) have argued this kind of model of and stabilize sexuality as an organizing prin- citizenship reinforces both the desirability ciple of social life. Yet there remains a ten- and necessity of sexual coupledom, privileged sion in western liberal societies, which are over other forms of relationships, as a basis becoming evermore plural and diverse and for many kinds of rights entitlements. More- place great emphasis on individualism, over, it represents the integration of lesbian between accepting ‘difference’ and the and gay men into a couple-based system of rights of individuals and, at the same time, rights originally founded on heterosexual upholding heterosexuality as the institution- and gendered norms. alized model of sexual relations. This is a The process of organizing around identi- tension that has been clear in both the ties such as lesbian and gay has also Clinton administration in the USA and in prompted a great deal debate about identity Blair’s government in the UK. In the latter as a basis for political action. In stressing the case, for example, we have witnessed this importance of ‘coming out’, for example, ‘balancing act’ played out in the New lesbian and gay liberation movements in the Labour government’s willingness to push 1970s ran the risk of seemingly accepting forward on the equalizing of the age of con- understandings of sexuality as an ‘essential’ sent at the same time as it has backed down aspect of self and the idea of a shared com- on its promise to remove the infamous mon identity. In the 1980s similar debates Section 28 from the statute books.1 raged within feminism over the possibility As part of this process of gaining access to of some kind of collective use of the term new forms of citizenship status we also need ‘woman’ for political purposes. The ques- to acknowledge that we are constituting cer- tion in this case is whether the category tain types of sexual citizen as ‘good’ and ‘woman’ can be used as a unifying, if not ‘bad’ citizens. Who is the good sexual citi- unified, concept. zen? ‘Good relationships’ are defined here in Although both feminist and gay and les- terms of an emphasis on monogamy, com- bian politics have critiqued essentialism, mitment, and coupledom. Rights continue to some gay interventions into politics use be linked to being in such a relationship. essentialist ideas strategically, with lesbians What, then, are the implications for those and gays conceptualized as a legitimate who are critical of the gendered heterosexual minority group having an ethnic status and norms underpinning citizenship? identity (Epstein, 1992). This is a strategy These debates over claims over citizen- that has been deployed in the USA, where ship represent struggles over the meaning of the parallels that have been made with Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 11

Introduction 11

race-based political aims and strategies have lesbian and gay studies in the future. As been extremely controversial, and it is also writers such as, for example, Dennis Altman being used in the UK in a variety of cam- (1996 and in this volume) and Carl Stychin paigns. Some critics argue that such tactical (1998) have noted, we must consider how use of essentialism will only ‘undermine the far lesbian and gay/queer politics developed overall aim of achieving social equality for in the USA can be deployed successfully lesbians and gays’ (Rahman, 2000: 122). elsewhere. What is required instead, it is claimed, is to deploy political identities as necessary signifiers of political subjects, a location NOTE from which to articulate social and material concerns, rather than an expression of essential sexual selves that define lesbians 1. Section 28 of the Local Government Act (1988), and gays as an ‘ethnic’ group. More recently, which outlaws the ‘promotion’ of homosexuality in state- discussion over whether lesbian and gay funded schools and defines lesbian and gay families as ‘pretended family relationships’, was overturned by the identities are re-essentialized through politi- Scottish Parliament in 2000, however, at the time of writ- cal struggles has been given new impetus by ing it continues to be the law in England. postmodern understandings of identity, where the emphasis is on fluidity and performativity (Butler, 1990, 1997). REFERENCES Rights do not exist in nature; they are products of social relations and of changing historical circumstances. In the present Altman, Dennis (1996) ‘Rupture or continuity? The inter- social climate, we are witnessing more and nationalization of gay identities’, Social Texts, 48: more rights-based arguments concerned 77–94. with sexual practices, identities, and relation- Bawer, (1993) A Place at the Table: The Gay Individual in American society. New York: Touchstone Books. ships. As we struggle to keep up with a Becker, Howard (1963) Outsiders. New York: Free Press. rapidly evolving and broadening concept of Butler, Judith (1990) Gender Trouble. London: Routledge. ‘sexual rights’, we must also respond by Butler, Judith (1997) ‘Critically queer’, in Shane Phelan extending and developing our frameworks (ed.), Playing With Fire: Queer Politics, Queer for understanding the sexual rights discourse. Theories. London: Routledge. We also need to recognize the wider social Chauncey, George (1994) Gay New York. New York: implications of such changes. Although it is a Basic Books. Delphy, Christine (1996) ‘The private as a deprivation of contested concept with various meanings rights for women and children’, paper given at the Inter- (Lister, 1997), citizenship is often associ- national Conference on Violence, Abuse and Women’s ated with membership of the nation state. Citizenship, Brighton, UK, November 1996. Clearly, the political strategies used and the D’Emilio, John. (1983) Sexual Politics, Sexual Communi- rights demands made by lesbian and gay ties. Chicago: Press. movements are shaped by both local and D’Emilio, John (2000) ‘Cycles of change, questions of national contexts. However, with the social strategy: the gay and lesbian movement after fifty years’, in Craig A. Rimmerman, Kenneth D. Wald and and political changes which have led to Clyde Wilcox (eds), The Politics of Gay Rights. ‘globalization’, comes the claim that we are London: University of Chicago Press. experiencing a globalizing of gay identity Epstein, Steven (1992) ‘Gay politics, ethnic identity’, in and politics that has led to the export of Edward Stein (ed.), Forms of Desire. New York: western definitions of sexual identities and Routledge. practices, as well as gay rights agendas, Faderman, Lillian (1981) Surpassing the Love of Men. London: Junction Books. around the world. The implications of Foucault, Michel (1980) . this globalized sexual citizenship, which New York: Pantheon. some critics argue is a form of cultural and Fuss, Diana (1990) Essentially Speaking: Feminism, sexual imperialism, is a key theme for Nature and Difference. London: Routledge. Ric-introduction.qxd 4/3/2002 7:19 PM Page 12

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