Girlfags und Guydykes
Girlfag is a term that developed in queer and pomosexual subcultures. It refers to a woman who feels a strong romantic or erotic attraction towards gay or bisexual men. She might partly or wholly feel like a "gay man trapped in a woman's body".[1] As girlfags feel attraction to gay men and to gay culture for its own sake, they have no interest in “turning gay men straight”. Girlfags might be attracted to other types of people as well. Their self-identification as gay, straight or bisexual, and as female, male or both may vary.[2]
The term girlfag seems to have been in use since the late 1990s.Vorlage:Fact At the time, authors like Carol Queen and Jill Nagle came out as girlfags.[3] The term came into wider use in 2000, when the Yahoo GirlFag group has been founded,Vorlage:Dubious which has gained more than 3000 members. [4] Since then, there have been resources and groups for girlfags internationally.[5] While in the past, the term fag hag seems to have referred both to women who were either platonically or romantically and sexually interested in gay men[6], today, fag hag refers to women who have platonic friendships with gay men, while girlfag refers to women who are romantically and sexually interested in gay men.Vorlage:Fact
As many girlfags identify “as a gay man trapped in a woman’s body”, the term is also connected to transfag, or to female-to-gay-male transsexual[7]
It has also been suggestedVorlage:By whom?, that some fujoshi, or female fans of yaoi might be gay male identified: “In her book Yaoi genron (1998), Sakakibara Shihomi, herself a popular yaoi-style novelist, describes herself as a gay man in a woman's body (a "female-to-male gay" transsexual). S/he suggests that this condition may be quite common among fans of this genre and may in fact be the reason for its existence.”[8] Bagemihl has shown that there are some similarities between fag hags, female-to-gay-male transsexuals and female fans of slash, another form of gay male erotica by women for women, that has been compared to yaoi: “There is nothing new about women identifying as gay men or eroticising and idealizing sexual relationships between men. In fact, striking parallels to the sentiments expressed by many female-to-gay male transsexuals can be found in two unlikely areas: 'fag-hagging' and K/S [Kirk/Spock] “slash” fanzines.”[9] If that is the case, the terms fujoshi, slash fan, and girlfag might describe related phenomena.[10]
Female-to-Gay-Male Desire in Literature and Science
There have been several female authors who have specialized on gay male fiction, e.g. Mary Renault. Some, like Poppy Z. Brite, have remarked that they use literature as a means to express a gay male gender identification.[11] Queer studies scholar Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick has written extensively about her gay male identification and relationships with gay men, and has stated it as an important motivation for her work: “Probably my own most formative influence from quite an early age has been a viscerally intense, highly speculative (not to say inventive) cross-identification with gay men and gay male cultures as I inferred, imagined, and later came to know them.”[12]
Guydyke
A guydyke is a man who feels a strong romantic or erotic attraction to bi and lesbian women, and who might identify partially or completely as a “lesbian in a man’s body”. The term was coined in about 2001 as an equivalent to girlfag.[13] The concept became more known when during Season 1 of the American and Canadian co-production television drama series The L-Word a lesbian-identified man called "Lisa" had a short relationship with a lesbian woman[14]Vorlage:Failed verification, though the term guydyke is not mentioned on screen.[15] Another example for a guydyke in popular fiction would be Stu from the comic Dykes to Watch out for by Alison Bechdel[16]Vorlage:Dubious While guydykes often participate in girlfag forums and groups, so far there is only one forum for guydykes (in German)[17]
Literature
- Queen, Carol u. Schimel, Laurence [Ed.]: PoMosexuals. USA: Cleis Press (1997).
- Meyer, Uli: "ALMOST HOMOSEXUAL" – Schwule Frauen/ Schwule Transgender (GirlFags/Trans*Fags) [2]
- Jill Nagle, "MANLY, YES, BUT I LIKE IT TOO: A self-described 'girlfag' reveals the truth behind her yen for sex with gay men", BUST Magazine, Summer 2003
- Clare T. Rampling, "Who's that girlfag?" BUST Magazine, Summer 2003, p. 65
- currently Janet W. Hardy, coauthor of "The Ethical Slut", is nearing completion of a memoir called "Girlfag: A Life Told In Sex and Musicals". see also: http://www.janetwhardy.com/
See also
References
External links
- http://www.girlfags.com
- The GirlFags Community at LifeJournal.com
- Appearance of three girlfags on The Tyra Banks Show
- http://girlfags.chapso.de: German homepage about GirlFags
- Interview with a GirlFag (German)
- German homepage about guydykes
- ↑ http://www.girlfags.com/faq.html
- ↑ 2,0 2,1 http://www.liminalis.de/artikel/Liminalis2007_meyer.pdf p. 75 (German Language)
- ↑ Queen, Carol “Beyond the Valley of Fag Hags”; Nagle, Jill “Stroking my Inner Faggot”; in: Queen, Carol u. Schimel, Laurence [Hrsg.] (1997) PoMosexuals. USA: Cleis Press
- ↑ Meyer, Uli „Almost Homosexual – Schwule Frauen, Schwule Trans*Gender (GirlFags/Trans*Fags)“ http://www.liminalis.de/artikel/Liminalis2007_meyer.pdf; Jill Nagle, "MANLY, YES, BUT I LIKE IT TOO: A self-described 'girlfag' reveals the truth behind her yen for sex with gay men", BUST Magazine, Summer 2003.
- ↑ http://www.girlfags.com; http://girlfags.chapso.de
- ↑ Bagemihl, Bruce (1997). “Surrogate Phonology and Transsexual Faggotry: A Linguistic Analogy for Uncoupling Sexual Orientation from Gender Identity”. In: Livia, Anna, and Hall, Kira [Ed.](1997). Queerly Phrased, Language, Gender, and Sexuality. Oxford: Oxford University Press; Moon, Dawne (1995) Insult and Inclusion: The Term Fag Hag and Gay Male Community. Social Forces, University of North Carolina Press. http://www.jstor.org/pss/2580489
- ↑ http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GirlFags/
- ↑ Matthew Thorn: “Girls And Women Getting Out Of Hand: The Pleasure And Politics Of Japan's Amateur Comics Community,” (2004), 185 F 4, http://matt-thorn.com/shoujo_manga/outofhand/index.php#back8 (accessed August 10, 2009); Meyer, Uli: “Hidden in Straight Sight – Transgressing Gender and Sexuality via BL” in: Pagliasotti, McHarry, Girls Doing Boys Doing Boys: Japanese Boys’ Love Anime and Manga in a Globalized World, McFarland & Company (in print)
- ↑ Bagemihl, Bruce (1997). “Surrogate Phonology and Transsexual Faggotry: A Linguistic Analogy for Uncoupling Sexual Orientation from Gender Identity”. In: Livia, Anna, and Hall, Kira [Ed.](1997). Queerly Phrased, Language, Gender, and Sexuality. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 386
- ↑ http://ashenwings.com/marks/2009/04/14/are-women-who-drawread-yaoi-girlfags/ ; Meyer, Uli “Hidden in Straight Sight – Transgressing Gender and Sexuality via BL” in: Levi, McHarry, Pagliasotti: Girls Doing Boys Doing Boys: Japanese Boys’ Love Anime and Manga in a Globalized World, McFarland & Company. (in print)
- ↑ Brite, Poppy Z. (1998) “Enough Rope” in: Tuttle, Lisa [Ed.] Crossing the Border: Tales of Erotic Ambiguity. USA: Indigo Books; http://www.poppyzbrite.com/rope.html
- ↑ Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick(1993): Tendencies. USA: Duke University Press , p. 14; Meyer, Uli: “Hidden in Straight Sight – Transgressing Gender and Sexuality via BL” in: Levi, McHarry, Pagliasotti: Girls Doing Boys Doing Boys: Japanese Boys’ Love Anime and Manga in a Globalized World, McFarland & Company. (in print); Meyer, Uli: „Almost Homosexual – Schwule Frauen, Schwule Trans*Gender (GirlFags/Trans*Fags)“ http://www.liminalis.de/artikel/Liminalis2007_meyer.pdf
- ↑ http://www.queerbychoice.com/clare.html
- ↑ http://www.thelwordonline.com/synopsis_ep7.shtml
- ↑ http://www.thelword-online.de/?s=charaktere&name=Lisa ; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_characters_from_The_L_Word
- ↑ http://dykestowatchoutfor.com/cast-biographies
- ↑ http://guydykes.funpic.de