Beyond the Lavender Lexicon: Authenticity, Imagination, and Appropriation in Lesbian and Gay Languages - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 2884491813 ISBN 13: 9782884491815

Publisher: Routledge, 1995

Synopsis

First Published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

About this title

Review

"This [book] opens an entirely new field in Gay/Lesbian Studies. There is nothing else like it. It marks a significant departure in the way the making of Gay/Lesbian communities is studied."
-Randolph Trumbach of Baruch College, CUNY, New York

Synopsis

In recent years, gay and lesbian communication has been characterized as gender-oriented dialects, secret codes of specialized argots, and imitations or paraphases of heterosexual discourse. This collection of 15 essays by linguists, anthropologists and historians explore directions in lesbian/gay discourse as comprised of distinct and independently developed linguistic constructions. It examines specific instances of language use, surveying the range of discourse skills which enable gay men and lesbians to make use of these "dialetics" when they talk amongst themselves and to others. By emphasizing that there are indeed gay/lesbian languages, this text draws attention not only to their distinctiveness, but also to their cultural and sociological significance in gay and lesbian life.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 2884491813
• ISBN 13: 9782884491815
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 426
• Editor: Leap William L.