ISBN:
9780520397583
Language:
English
Pages:
1 online resource (281 pages)
Edition:
1st ed.
Parallel Title:
Erscheint auch als
DDC:
306.76/60972
Abstract:
Being gay is not a given. Through a rigorous ethnographic inquiry into the material foundations of sexual identity, The Struggle to Be Gay makes a compelling argument for the centrality of social class in gay life--in Mexico, for example, and by extension in other places as well. Known for his writings on the construction of sexual identities, anthropologist and cultural studies scholar Roger N. Lancaster ponders four decades of visits to Mexican cities. In a brisk series of reflections combining storytelling, ethnography, critique, and razor-edged polemic, he shows, first, how economic inequality affects sexual subjects and subjectivities in ways both obvious and subtle, and, second, how what it means to be de ambiente--"on the scene" or "in the life"--has metamorphosed under changing political-economic conditions. The result is a groundbreaking intervention into ongoing debates over identity politics--and a renewal of our understanding of how identities are constructed, struggled for, and lived.
Abstract:
Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction: When the Music Stops -- Part I. Predicament and crisis: The Struggle for Self-Determination -- 1. Moment of Truth -- 2. A Provisional Answer to the Question -- 3. Life's Rich Pageant -- 4. Commonplaces -- 5. Precarious Lives -- Part II. Ambiente and ambiguity: The Struggle for what eludes us -- 6. Fable of Rapport -- 7. Identity and Its Discontents -- 8. They Lived in a Different Time from Us -- 9. Putos -- 10. Postcards from the Ambiente -- 11. Urban Tribes -- 12. A Tale of Two Cities -- Conclusion: The Horizons of Gay Identity -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index.
Note:
Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources
