Interrogating Homonormativity: Gay Men, Identity and Everyday Life
Abstract
"Using interviews to nuance his careful analysis, Mowlabocus shines a bright light on the current conundrums of queer everyday life."
— Professor Lisa Duggan, Department of Social & Cultural Analysis, New York University, USA.
"This is an exceptional book, which interrogates the complex ways in which marriage equality has changed the place of gay men in contemporary (British) society, exposing how formal equality continues to overlook sexual difference and ends up obscuring demands for genuine equity."
— Dr. Gavin Brown, Professor of Political Geography & Sexualities, Leicester, UK.
"A pleasure to read, this book offers reflections that are refreshingly grounded in the experiences of gay men today dealing with a new world of legal rights in a context of declining public gay spaces and at best conditional public acceptance."
— Dr. Barry Adam, Distinguished University Professor Emeritus of Sociology, University of Windsor, Canada.
This book explores the concept of homonormativity and examines how the politics of homonormativity has shaped the lives and practices of gay men living primarily in the UK. The book adopts a case study approach in order to examine how homonormativity is shaping relationships within gay male culture, and between this culture and mainstream society. The book features chapters on same-sex marriage, HIV treatment, dating and hook-up culture, sexualized drug use and the world of work. Throughout these chapters, the book develops a conversation regarding the role that neoliberalism has played in defining gay male identities and practices in the UK and USA. If homonormativity is understood as the sexual politics of neoliberalism, this book considers to what extent those sexual politics pervade gay men’s sense of self, their relationships with each other, their experience of the spaces they occupy in everyday life, and the identities they inhabit in the workplace.
Sharif Mowlabocus is Associate Professor in the Department of Communication and Media Studies at Fordham University, New York, USA. He holds a PhD in Media and Cultural Studies from the University of Sussex, UK, and is the author of several books and research articles. His research focuses primarily on Western gay male culture and its engagement with new forms of communication, mediation and representation.
... Dating platforms emphasize the visuality of user profiles, thus heightening the prominence of race, a visible characteristic, in partner search (Berkowitz et al., 2021;Robinson, 2015). The options to search for or filter out dating candidates by race dehumanize individuals with personhood and dignity to a few predefined racial categories (Mowlabocus, 2021;Robinson, 2015). The impersonal and anonymous setting of digital platforms may further fuel sexual racism as it places little sanction on the exclusion of an entire racial group from one's dating pool (Albury et al., 2017;Curington et al., 2021). ...
... Global politics shaping the digitalization of family life are not always imposed from the top down. As the Black Lives Matter movement spread worldwide from the bottom up, Grindr (a major gay dating app) removed its "ethnicity filter" (Mowlabocus, 2021). Together, these examples illustrate that the macro-level "structuration" of family life online is "a set of processes rather than fixed external structures" (Morgan, 2011, p. 7). ...
... Collectively, the users call out, challenge, and resist sexual racism and discrimination to demand sociocultural change in online dating. In response, Grindr launched a Kindr campaign to demonstrate the company's commitment to combatting sexual racism and discrimination, including updating its community guidelines and imposing a lifetime ban on users for discriminatory behaviors and hate speech on the app (Mowlabocus, 2021). In another example, sexual minority individuals and families in Japan rallied those sharing similar identities and experiences from around the world online, to demand legal recognition of same-sex partnerships from the Japanese government (Yamamura, 2023). ...
The internet and digital technologies have penetrated all domains of people's lives, and family life is no exception. Despite being a characterizing feature of contemporary family change, the digitalization of family life has yet to be systematically theorized. Against this backdrop, this article develops a multilevel conceptual framework for understanding the digitalization of family life and illustrates the framework by synthesizing state‐of‐the‐art research from multiple disciplines across global contexts. At a micro level, as individuals “do” family online, digitalization influences diverse aspects of family practices, including family formation, functioning, and contact. How individuals “do” family online is not free‐floating but embedded in macro‐level economic, sociocultural, and political systems underpinning processes of digitalization. Bridging the micro–macro divide, family‐focused online communities serve as a pivotal intermediary at the meso level, where people display family life to, and exchange family‐related support with, mostly nonfamily members. Meso‐level online communities are key sites for forming and diffusing collective identities and shared family norms. Bringing together the three levels, the framework also considers cross‐level interrelations to develop a holistic digital ecology of family life. The article concludes by discussing the contributions of the framework to understanding family change and advancing family scholarship in the digital age.
... This same sense of agitation inspired Duggan's (2003) aforementioned notion of 'homonormativity'-that is, politics that embrace heteronormative institutions and conspicuous consumption, and valorise individual freedoms as part of a generally privatised and 'depoliticised' gay culture. Despite reasonable qualms about the morphological structure of 'homo' þ 'normativity', and valid concerns of how too-strident critiques of 'assimilationist' LGBTQ politics denigrate so-called 'ordinary' lives (Brown 2012), Duggan's definition of homonormativity is germane to my analysis: a resource for critically examining how mediatised discourse crafts-and hijacksqueer relationality (Mowlabocus 2021). 4 Recent discussion of queer theory's contributions to sociolinguistic knowledge underlines the importance of 'communal imaginings' as a source of intersubjectivity, rightly noting that queer people perennially engage in 'strategically normative' practices of identity formation (Lazar 2017) and always desire identity, if unpredictably and in non-essential forms: 'identity just IS' (Hall 2013:636). ...
... In this way, it demonstrates further how homonormativity can be identified in the 'contours,… textures and… ruptures' (Mowlabocus 2021:32) found in the politics of everyday life; a world-building project which extends from our innermost subjectivities and desires to the supposedly infinite potentialities of neoliberalism. It co-opts many 'mainstream' gay and lesbian signifiersthemselves borne through capitalist consumption (D'Emilio 1983)-to evolve modern LGBTQ communities and politics in its own fashion, alongside Trojan horse-like performances such as #HoldTight that suggest a more substantive revolution that will never come (Mowlabocus 2021). Scholars like Miranda Joseph long ago warned against 'the romance of community' (Joseph 2002)how forces of capital incorporate senses of kinship, breeding a complicity between feelgood cultural and communal values and the unequal circulation of economic value. ...
Across the contemporary world, neoliberalism operates as an anticipatory regime through which mediatised conceptions of the future are aligned to an aggressive (absolute) marketisation of social life. Alongside a critical, queer-theoretical attention to homonormativity, this article uses multimodal critical discourse studies techniques to analyse how such a neoliberal future for LGBTQ people is envisioned in #HoldTight, a pride campaign by an Australian and New Zealand bank. #HoldTight focused on how the act of holding hands can be turned from a source of shame to a joyful, powerful tool for social action: ‘if you feel like letting go, hold tight’. My cultural-phenomenological analysis of #HoldTight demonstrates how this imbrication of LGBTQ rights discourse and mediatised capitalism engaged embodied, hopeful affects as semiotic resources. In this way, I argue that the bank enshrined a speculative, anticipatory chronotope of a future better world, while validating neoliberal governmentality as a benevolent form of LGBTQ agency. (Neoliberalism, multimodal critical discourse studies, queer linguistics, affect, embodiment, cultural phenomenology)*
... Here, I use Warner's (1991) definition of heteronormativity as a default setting of modern culture wherein heterosexuality has been accepted as normal or the preferred sexual orientation. Mowlabocus (2021) said of this that "a reduced engagement with : : : matters of racial justice, gender equality or the working class, means that these rights and interests are inevitably ones that are prioritised by, and which most directly benefit, White, cis-gendered middle-class people" (p. 23). ...
This research explores why racialized queer and gay men work out prior to Pride events in Pride Toronto and Fierté Montréal. The findings show that muscular aesthetics are a type of gay social capital, and participants acknowledge that this may also increase undesired attention and limitations because of their racialized bodies. Participants voice the paradox of the “unspoken rule,” which derives from ideas of authenticity and superficiality. To be one’s most genuine self, racialized queer and gay men must achieve a high physical bodily aesthetic but may lose identity and agency. Yet, they transform their bodies as a daily dedication to their own well-being. Most seem to be aware of the contradictions and tensions in developing a muscled body, which is a personal journey each of them went through to find their own understanding and meaning.
... The "good" warias are framed within the cisheteronorm and become part of the nation, while the "bad" ones are only intelligible through their abjected and marginalized status. In this respect, the concept of transnormativity has been used recently by some scholars, drawing on the theoretical work of homonormativity (Mowlabocus, 2021;Duggan, 2002). This could be explored further within the Indonesian context but is not within the scope of the article. ...
... Homonormativity, a term first introduced by Warner (1991) and developed by Duggan (2002), reflects a political strategy that shifts away from social liberation movements towards assimilation into the prevailing systems of class and gender oppressions as well as white supremacy (Mowlabocus 2021). By focusing on the primacy of the married couple as the central political issue, heteronormativity became "a strategy for privatizing gay politics and culture for the new neoliberal world order" (Duggan 2002, 188). ...
This study explores how an undercover sting that targeted men soliciting sex with other men around public park toilets in Fresno, California, led to an increase in resources for local law enforcement, including a surveillance system that stretched beyond the park and into poor Black and Brown neighborhoods. We use the literature on policy entrepreneurship to make sense of the power of police both to quell opposition to unpopular public safety initiatives and to make the case for administrative expansion. This case study demonstrates that creating panic about public same-sex erotic activity can be utilized without appearing homophobic or drawing the wrath of LGBTQ+ rights groups, especially when focusing on the dangers to children. We argue that the men arrested for lewd conduct were simply collateral damage and not seen worthy of defense.
... Israel's powerful pro-natalist and nationalist discourse have enabled the inclusion of LGBT+ subjects in certain aspects of Jewish mainstream culture through participation in the two major pillars of society: reproduction and military service (Gross 2015). This sort of constrained inclusion of LGBT+ individuals is referred to as homonormativity (Duggan 2002)a neoliberal politics of gay assimilationand homonationalism (Puar 2007(Puar , 2013, LGBT+ nationalism and citizenship practices (Bell 1994;Bell and Binnie 2006;Richardson 2000;Seidman 2001), combined with assimilationist homonormative politics (Mowlabocus 2021). Homonationalism thus refers to a combination of national inclusion (and exclusion) and neoliberal assimilation processes (i.e., homonormativity) (Puar 2007). ...
... Homonormativity is rooted in heteronormativity, and therefore proposes heteronormative-style binaries for same-sex couples, resulting in a tendency to create narratives that demonstrate that LGBTQIA+ parents are the same as straight parents (Esposito, 2009;Hedberg et al., 2022;Taylor, 2012). Duggan (2002) sees homonormativity as a neoliberal strategy to establish and maintain a status quo, to confirm existing power structures, to normalize and privilege heterosexuality (Bartholomay, 2018;Mowlabocus, 2021). Queer people are thereby aligned with traditional notions of masculinity and femininity and parental roles (Powell et al., 2011). ...
Link to 50 free eprints: https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/KSKPBMT45SHMKN9AU4QK/full?target=10.1080/00918369.2023.2291054
Picture books are a central part of early childhood and contribute to the picture children form of the world. While most picture books are oriented toward the concept of heteronormativity, more picture books featuring same-sex parents have been published in recent years. This article addresses the question of how same-sex parents are portrayed with regard to gender roles. Data stems from 23 German-language picture books, 17 with two mothers, six with two fathers. A quantitative coding approach was used to capture the portrayal of gender roles. The analyses showed that parents (especially fathers) are depicted as engaging in emotional or caring activities. Although in a large number of picture books both parents provide care and household-related activities, there is a statistically significant difference in terms of one parent performing these activities more frequently. In this respect, it can be seen that the portrayal of same-sex parents is partially oriented toward homonormativity, as these activities are usually depicted as female.
... To be clear, this event was (unsurprisingly) a lavish advertisement for the non-performativity of diversity management and neoliberal citizenship as a pathway to LGBTQ liberation. It was rigidly homonormativeits commitment to LGBTQ inclusion matched by a commitment to 'promoting universally desirable forms of economic expansion and democratic government around the world.' (Duggan, 2003, p. 10; see Mowlabocus, 2021 for an exceptional overview). Though I lack space to elaborate on this, many well-known critiques of the 'sexual politics of neoliberalism' are implicated by the semiotic practices described and analyses undertaken here. ...
... Furthermore, all Israeli gay politicians exhibit in their biographies and political attitudes exemplary homonormativity, that is, a politics that does not challenge heteronormative assumptions. Homonormative LGBTQ pursue and aspire for assimilation within the prevailing social and political order without challenging the status quo (Gross, 2015;Hartal and Sasson-Levy, 2018;Mowlabocus, 2021). This phenomenon is widespread around the world, where most LGBTQ elected officials strive for assimilation (Reynolds, 2020). ...
This study identifies how three prominent Israeli online newspapers frame gay Members of Knesset (Israeli parliament) and cabinet ministers. 2019 was chosen since the number of gay MKs reached a historic milestone of representation. The study employed a mixed-methods design, combining descriptive statistics, based on a quantitative content analysis, with a thematic qualitative analysis. 1015 retrieved news items constituted the initial database. They were divided into two categories: “Gay relevant” (items explicitly referring to, or mentioning the politician’s sexual orientation); or “Gay irrelevant” (all other items), to thematically focus on the Gay relevant items ( N = 159). Six themes were then identified: Novelty; LGBTQ Political Representation; Private Sphere; Homophobia; Community Recognition and Rights; and Incongruity. Findings revealed that elite newspaper coverage is similar to popular ones; cabinet ministers’ framing is more neutral compared to junior MKs; and liberal MKs are framed differently than conservative ones.
... Israel's powerful pro-natalist and nationalist discourse have enabled the inclusion of LGBT+ subjects in certain aspects of Jewish mainstream culture through participation in the two major pillars of society: reproduction and military service (Gross 2015). This sort of constrained inclusion of LGBT+ individuals is referred to as homonormativity (Duggan 2002)a neoliberal politics of gay assimilationand homonationalism (Puar 2007(Puar , 2013, LGBT+ nationalism and citizenship practices (Bell 1994;Bell and Binnie 2006;Richardson 2000;Seidman 2001), combined with assimilationist homonormative politics (Mowlabocus 2021). Homonationalism thus refers to a combination of national inclusion (and exclusion) and neoliberal assimilation processes (i.e., homonormativity) (Puar 2007). ...
... Queering standpoints in technoscience would craft situated and idiosyncratic responses to heteronormativities and allied homonormativities (see Duggan, 2002;Mowlabocus, 2021) in technoscience research. The radical relationality of queer ing means that technoscience practitioners need not identify as LGBTQ+ to develop queering standpoints. ...
Chapter 18 in Gender, Feminist and Queer Studies: Power, Privilege and Inequality in a Time of Neoliberal Conservatism, edited by Donna Bridges, Cliff Lewis, Elizabeth Wulff, Chelsea Litchfield & Larissa Bamberry. 2023.
Neoliberal technoscience seeks to co-opt LGBTQ+ and allied researcher diversities to satisfy its unjust desires. This chapter considers how standpoint methodologies and queer theorising can resist neoliberalism’s commodifying embrace of diversity to reorient technoscience toward the flourishing of all humans and other beings. Feminist critics have asked how it is possible to do technoscience for social justice when its normal ways of knowing and intervening disregard or oppose the interests of most humans and other beings, and when technoscience equity initiatives seek increased demographic diversity in knowledge-making regimes that otherwise remain largely unchallenged. Technoscience under neoliberalism solicits underrepresented groups because diversity, as a normative institutional virtue, is seen as advancing, not challenging, existing values and goals. Despite this solicitousness, institutional and cultural barriers to difference remain that advocacy groups are working to expose and eliminate. While increased diversity in technoscience is worthy, this chapter envisions more radical change in which advocacy groups foster queering standpoints of resistance to neoliberalism in technoscience and society. Queering standpoints would extend feminist standpoint methodologies toward broader visions of where and how liberatory standpoints can arise from lives and sensibilities on the interior margins of technoscience.
In this forum piece, I utilize Rahul Rao’s concept of “homocapitalism” (2020) as an analytical lens through which to evaluate the corporate support of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) rights. Affinity groups, including those designed to support LGBTQ employees, have become a regular feature of most Fortune 500 companies. These groups seek to represent the interests of particular employee audiences, while also helping the company to advance its profit-driven goals. Drawing on interviews with queer professionals working for multinational technology companies, I signpost the promises and limitations of LGBTQ activism when it becomes (re)located within the context of a corporation.
On digital hook-up apps for same-sex attracted men, it is common to read requests for “discretion” from “discreet” men expecting others be the same. Such discretionary language is not new but has evolved and shifted as it became coded into the affordances of hook-up apps. We argue to be discreet is not necessarily to be “closeted” or to be a “MSM” (man who has sex with men). Drawing on our research of men who engage with online same-sex hook-ups, we consider the context of discretionary language used. We discuss how this illustrates the paradox of discretionary language, where requests for discretion typically imply the requester is seeking to act indiscreetly in some fashion.
Leading theories of the recent history of sexuality have pointed to trends toward detraditionalization and precarity in intimate relations, but also to democratization and innovation. This study grounded in 79 qualitative interviews with men seeking men online considers their experiences in light of these theories. The rise of dating apps has generated sexual fields that have shaped the sexual subjectivities of the current era in multiple ways. The narratives of study participants show much more than the hook-up culture that dating apps are best known for. They speak to experiences of superficiality, unmet expectations, and sometimes bruising intersections with hierarchies defined by age, race, body type, gender expression, and serostatus. Yet at the same time, they show a strong aspiration to sociability, social network building, and reach for a language of affiliation beyond the kin and friendship terms of the larger society. Generational comparisons indicate the shifting sexual subjectivities that dating apps have shaped by constituting virtual sexual fields.
Homonormativity refers to the ratification and endorsement of heteronormative institutions and structures into lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) lives, culture and discourse. While homonormativity is commonly manifested in (relatively) privileged, White, able‐bodied gay men, this paper focuses on lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LBT) women's experiences in Israeli peripheral and rural spaces. As a concept, homonormativity has the potential of reducing lived experiences into a widely criticized category. Instead, we voice the geographical, temporal and gendered potential of homonormative processes to articulate varied ways for leading a queer life under capitalism. Based on 61 qualitative interviews with LBT women living in the Israeli peripheries, we argue that LBT women employ two major homonormative processes of becoming political subjects to negotiate their sexualities in a space fraught with LGBTphobia. These homonormative processes are comprised of assimilation and contestation, revealing a nuanced mode of political subjectivity, shaped by ongoing experiences of LGBTphobia.
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