Bringing together forty-two groundbreaking essays--many of them already classics--The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader provides a much-needed introduction to the contemporary state of lesbian/gay studies, extensively illustrating the range, scope, diversity, appeal, and power of the work currently being done in the field. Featuring essays by such prominent scholars as Judith Butler, John D'Emilio, Kobena Mercer, Adrienne Rich, Gayle Rubin, and Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader explores a multitude of sexual, ethnic, racial, and socio-economic experiences. Ranging across disciplines including history, literature, critical theory, cultural studies, African American studies, ethnic studies, sociology, anthropology, psychology, classics, and philosophy, this anthology traces the inscription of sexual meanings in all forms of cultural expression. Representing the best and most significant English language work in the field, The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader addresses topics such as butch-fem roles, the cultural construction of gender, lesbian separatism, feminist theory, AIDS, safe-sex education, colonialism, S/M, Oscar Wilde, Gertrude Stein, children's books, black nationalism, popular films, Susan Sontag, the closet, homophobia, Freud, Sappho, the media, the hijras of India, Robert Mapplethorpe, and the politics of representation. It also contains an extensive bibliographical essay which will provide readers with an invaluable guide to further reading.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Copyright Information xi
Introduction xv
User's Guide xix
I POLITICS AND REPRESENTATION
Thinking Sex: Notes for a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality
3 (42)
Gayle S. Rubin
Epistemology of the Closet
45 (17)
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick
Deviance, Politics, and the Media
62 (29)
Stuart Hall
Some Reflections on Separatism and Power
91 (8)
Marilyn Frye
Homophobia: Why Bring It Up?
99 (4)
Barbara Smith
One Is Not Born a Woman
103 (7)
Monique Wittig
Silences: ``Hispanics,'' AIDS, and Sexual Practices
110 (17)
Ana Maria Alonso
Maria Teresa Koreck
From Nation to Family: Containing African AIDS
127 (14)
Cindy Patton
II SPECTACULAR LOGIC
Sexual Indifference and Lesbian Representation
141 (18)
Teresa De Lauretis
Eloquence and Epitaph: Black Nationalism and the Homophobic Impulse in Responses to the Death of Max Robinson
159 (17)
Phillip Brian Harper
Television/Feminism: HeartBeat and Prime Time Lesbianism
176 (10)
Sasha Torres
Commodity Lesbianism
186 (16)
Danae Clark
The Spectacle of AIDS
202 (10)
Simon Watney
Sontag's Urbanity
212 (9)
D.A. Miller
``Just When You Thought It Was Safe to Go Back in the Water...''
221 (6)
Daniel L. Selden
III SUBJECTIVITY, DISCIPLINE, RESISTANCE
Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence
227 (28)
Adrienne Rich
Chicano Men: A Cartography of Homosexual Identity and Behavior
255 (19)
Tomas Almaguer
Lesbian Identity and Autobiographical Difference[s]
274 (20)
Biddy Martin
Toward a Butch-Femme Aesthetic
294 (13)
Sue-Ellen Case
Imitation and Gender Insubordination
307 (14)
Judith Butler
Spare Parts: The Surgical Construction of Gender
321 (18)
Marjorie Garber
IV ``THE USES OF THE EROTIC''
The Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power
339 (5)
Audre Lorde
The Boys in My Bedroom
344 (6)
Douglas Crimp
Looking for Trouble
350 (10)
Kobena Mercer
Robert Mapplethorpe and the Discipline of Photography
360 (21)
Richard Meyer
Freud, Male Homosexuality, and the Americans
381 (16)
Henry Abelove
V ``THE EVIDENCE OF EXPERIENCE''
The Evidence of Experience
397 (19)
Joan W. Scott
Is There a History of Sexuality?
416 (16)
David M. Halperin
``They Wonder to Which Sex I Belong'': The Historical Roots of the Modern Lesbian Identity
432 (21)
Martha Vicinus
``Lines She Did Not Dare'': Angelina Weld Grimke, Harlem Renaissance Poet
453 (14)
Gloria T. Hull
Capitalism and Gay Identity
467 (12)
John D'Emilio
VI COLLECTIVE IDENTITIES/DISSIDENT IDENTITIES
Androgynous Males and Deficient Females: Biology and Gender Boundaries in Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century China
479 (19)
Charlotte Furth
The Bow and the Burden Strap: A New Look at Institutionalized Homosexuality in Native North America
498 (30)
Harriet Whitehead
Just One of the Boys: Lesbians in Cherry Grove, 1960--1988
528 (14)
Esther Newton
Hijras as Neither Man Nor Woman
542 (11)
Serena Nanda
Tearooms and Sympathy, or, The Epistemology of the Water Closet
553 (24)
Lee Edelman
VII BETWEEN THE PAGES
Double Consciousness in Sappho's Lyrics
577 (18)
John J. Winkler
De-constructing the Lesbian Body: Cherrie Moraga's Loving in the War Years
595 (9)
Yvonne Yarbro-Bejarano
When Jack Blinks: Si(gh)ting Gay Desire in Ann Bannon's Beebo Brinker
604 (12)
Michele Aina Barale
``It's Not Safe. Not Safe at All'': Sexuality in Nella Larsen's Passing
616 (10)
Deborah E. McDowell
Different Desires: Subjectivity and Transgression in Wilde and Gide
626 (16)
Jonathan Dollimore
The Somagrams of Gertrude Stein
642 (11)
Catharine R. Stimpson
Suggestions for Further Reading