Social constructionists argue that labels must be rejected (or
deconstructed) because they are allegedly the tools of external social control.
Some modern gay apologists fondly believe that there was once a golden age when
no one was labelled and everyone enjoyed fluid sexuality. Thus Cowan (1988)
says that ‘Throughout much of human history it seems that people – both gay and
straight – could live comfortably without a name for the "love that dare
not speak its name". In biblical times it was enough for David to simply
say that his love for Jonathan "was wonderful, passing the love of
women".’
What an extraordinary example to choose: it means precisely the
opposite of what Cowan says! The whole point about this famous biblical passage
is that the lack of a name for David’s love made it difficult to speak about
it. It manifestly does not demonstrate a ‘simple’, ‘comfortable’
acceptance of something common – on the contrary, it vividly illustrates the
struggle to describe something ‘wonderful’ and very special and beyond the
common conceptions available at the time. Contrary to this love being a
commonplace occurrence, David loved Jonathan ‘as he loved his own soul’ – a
phrase having ‘no parallel anywhere else in the Jewish Scriptures’ (Boswell
1994).
In biblical times it became the archetype for true, lasting love,
pointedly set against the transitoriness of heterosexual passion.
The relationship between language and experience has been one of
the central problems of philosophy for centuries. In more recent times the
issue has been the complex relationship between language and identity. The
social constructionist school maintains the omnipotence of words: I label you,
therefore you are. The school is rooted in structuralism, a linguistic/semantic
approach to literature, in which text rather than context is the final arbiter
of meaning. The sociological development of the theory maintains that the
homosexual did not exist as a personality type or identity until he (or she)
was labelled, that the labelling occurred in the work of the sexologists in the
late nineteenth century, and that therefore homosexuals did not exist until
they were created, i.e. constructed, in the late nineteenth century.
The
traditionalist or essentialist rejects the philosophical presumption that
meaning precedes experience, and adopts the common-sense view that homosexual
identity precedes labelling. Despite the sophistication with which social
constructionists deal with epistemes and semiotext(e)s, they are profoundly ignorant
of historical linguistics.
In the search for specific words or labels for homosexuality we
should not ignore the fact that most people use euphemisms or phrases made up
of ordinary words to describe what they do. Even today most people do not use a
specific word to describe themselves when engaged in intercrural intercourse,
although slang words are available. When General Kuno Count von Moltke
explained in court his sexual relations with Philipp Prince zu
Eulenburg-Hertefeld, in the first decade of the twentieth century, all he could
say was this: ‘Fooling around. I don’t know of no real name for it.
When we
went rowing we just did it in the boat.’ ‘Fooling around’ was perhaps the most
frequently used euphemism during the 1920s through 1940s, and is probably still
the term used by adolescents engaging in their first ‘experiments’. In the
early 1930s British gay men referred to each other as ‘so’ and ‘musical’, terms
gradually supplanted by ‘queer’, which may have been used earlier by the Irish
and was popularized in theatrical circles (Skinner 1978). To say that such
words show lack of scientific refinement is quite true, but everyone knows
exactly what they mean – even when they use such vague terms as ‘it’ and ‘that
way’.
The absence of language does not indicate the absence of
conceptual thought. The concept of lesbian sex existed even when no particular
term was used to identify it. Donoghue (1993) documents the use of generic
terms such as ‘kind’, ‘species’ and ‘genius’ (i.e. genus) in mid-eighteenth-century
discussions of lesbians, abstract phrases such as ‘feminine congression’ or
‘accompanying with other women’, and abundant euphemisms: ‘irregular’,
‘uncommon’, ‘unaccountable’ and ‘unnatural’, ‘vicious Irregularities’,
‘unaccountable intimacies’, ‘uncommon and preternatural Lust’, ‘unnatural
Appetities in both Sexes’, ‘unnatural affections’, ‘abominable and unnatural
pollutions’.
There is much evidence to suggest that the earlier use of the word
‘hermaphrodite’ was as much a euphemism for ‘homosexual’ as the modern term
‘bisexual’. There is ever-increasing pressure towards abstraction; in many
circles today, gay men are called ‘men-who-have-sex-with-men (MSM)’, while
lesbians are regularly called ‘women-loving-women’. On the Internet, all groups
are now embraced within the acronym MOTSS (members of the same sex) or LGBTQ
(lesbian gay bisexual transgender queer). This may be convenient, but I don’t
think it is an advance in epistemology.
We do have to acknowledge that there do not seem to exist words in
early languages which correspond to male and female homosexual, or male and female same-sex relations
simultaneously. In other words, there don’t seem to be any words for this high
level of abstration until the discipline of sexology begins in relatively
modern times.
It does not necesssarily follow, however, that there were no
words for homosexuality as a general concept, and that it was not until the
modern age that abstract, generic, ‘scientific’ terms were invented for
homosexuality. Before we attach too much significance to the absence of terms
that simultaneously cover male and female homosexuality, consider the
following.
When modern people use the word ‘homosexual’ or ‘homosexuality’,
nine times out of ten they are thinking of male same-sex relations. Only at the last
minute will they say, ‘Oh, yeah, this includes women too’, but even then they
will probably use the other term ‘lesbian’. When the terms were coined in the
late nineteenth century, they were used predominantly – in fact almost entirely
– in the context of legal prohibitions against sex between men. ‘Inverts’ were
almost always considered to be men.
When John Addington Symonds worked with
Havelock Ellis on the bookSexual
Inversion, the first book on homosexuality in English, only at the
last minute was Symonds persuaded to include a chapter on female homosexulity
in his historical survey. (Ellis’s wife Edith was a lesbian, and she got her
lesbian friends to contribute their case studies to the project. In her circle,
they used the word ‘lesbian’ rather than ‘female sexual
inversion/homosexuality’, but eventually this was sublimated into the abstract
consideration by her husband.)
A second thing to consider is that it is really only in the
English language that you can have one single word for both sexes, because
European (and most other) languages require different forms for masculine and
feminine (and neuter) nouns etc. Strictly speaking, the words that were coined
in German were homosexualist (which means ‘male homosexual’) and homosexualistin (which means ‘female homosexual’).
The
same division is true for other equivalent words (e.g. in Ulrichs’s system Urningthum meant specifically male homosexuality,
the Urningwas specifically a male homosexual, and
the female homosexual was anUrningin.
Ulrichs’s classification system has more than 30 terms, but though they are all
very ‘scientific’ and abstract, the only term that applies equally to men and
women is Urnische Liebe,
‘homosexual love’ (though even that is really used most of the time about men).
When we stand back and look at his system, it appears as though he has
conceptualized the abstract concepts of ‘the homosexual’ and ‘the bisexual’ and
‘the heterosexual’, but I think all his concepts, strictly speaking, label
specifically male or female examples of these.
The claim that in ancient and indigenous cultures there are no
words for homosexuality as a general concept, is true only if you insist that
the term simultaneously encompasses men and women. Even then it’s not entirely
true, because Aquinas defined ‘the vice of sodomy’ as ‘male with male and
female with female’, which satisfies the requirements for abstract
inclusiveness. If you don’t insist that the term encompass men and women, then
you will find terms for male homosexuality and male homosexuals as general
concepts, and female homosexuality and female homosexuals as general concepts,
and male and female heterosexuals and heterosexuality as general concepts.
For example, ancient cuneiform texts have been found describing
male homosexuality as a generalized concept, ‘the love of a man for a man’, and
one cuneiform text mentions lesbians. As early as the third century BC Hellenic
writers coined the word gunaikerastria to denote sexual relations between
women. This term means ‘female lover of women’ and is as scientific a term as
one could wish, less euphemistic than ‘lesbian’, more economical than ‘sex
between women’, and devoid of value judgements.
There were many ancient terms for abstract concepts or categories
of homosexual. In the Byzantine Empire there were several words for male
homosexuality in general (rather than words for effeminate or receptive
homosexuality in particular): paiderastia,
pederasty; arrhenomixia,
mingling with males; arrhenokoitia,
coitus with males. The two latter terms are perfect behaviourist equivalents to
‘homosexuality’.
Paiderastia, from Classical Greek paiderastes, boy-lover, is
itself a general concept, strictly speaking no narrower than the modern
‘man-lover’. Boswell (1994) points out that ‘the most common words for
"child" in both Greek (pais) and Latin (puer) also mean
"slave," so in many cases when an adult is said to be having sex with
someone designated by these terms it could simply be with his slave or
servant’.
In other words paiderastia, pederasty, is not necessarily
narrowly confined to boys, but may be closer to ‘homosexuality’ than modern
historians acknowledge. The pederastic pair consists of the erastes and the eromenos, ‘lover’ and
‘beloved’; we can infer an active/passive division, but strictly speaking these
are not examples of inserter/receptor terminology, and the term ‘boyfriend’ was
not used in a particularly derogatory fashion. The modern Greeks, under the
influence of (American) English usage, have abandoned these terms, and use the
awkward term omophylophilia.
Metaphors and tropes are as important for understanding homosexual
culture as more precise ‘scientific’ terms. Among the ancient Toltecs
(conquered by the Aztecs), queers worshipped the transgender god/goddess of
non-procreative sexuality and flowers named Xochiquetzal, and sodomy was called
the ‘Dance of the Flowers’.
In China, metaphors such as ‘the passion of the cut
sleeve’ or ‘the southern custom’ encompassed queer-cultural values of love and
loyalty for some two thousand years. The earliest Chinese word referring to
homosexual relations dates from the sixth century, nanfeng, literally ‘male wind’
(still used today as a literary expression for male homosexuality), perhaps
more accurately translated as ‘male custom’ or ‘male practice’ (Hinsch 1990).
Another term from this period is nanse,
male lust or male eroticism (se denotes
sexual attraction or passion). These words are as abstract (hence ‘scientific’)
as the word ‘homosexuality’ coined thirteen hundred years later.
Nanfeng actually has two sets of characters
pronounced the same, one meaning ‘male custom’ and the other meaning ‘southern
custom’ (‘man’ and ‘south’ are both pronounced nan). Homosexuality is believed
to have been especially popular in Fujian and Guangdong, the southern regions
of China, and ‘southern custom’ was the term for homosexuality during the Ming
period; nanfeng shu, the
southern custom tree, which consists of two trees, one larger than the other,
entwined with one another to become one, was a standard icon of homosexuality
in Chinese literature (Ng 1989, Hinsch 1990).
The Chinese language is particularly rich in queer metaphors that
do not relate directly to sex/gender roles, but to a larger complex of queer
culture with an emphasis upon desires, tendencies, preferences and emotional
commitments rather than sexual acts.
Apart from Chinese, Tamil and Kannada language is rich with queer metaphors according to Keshiraja's Sapthamanitharpana (Kannada Grammar) he refers more than 9 genders. Tamil texts and Grammar supports gender diversity.
The two main terms for male homosexual
relations, ‘passion of the cut sleeve’ (duanxiu pi orpian) and ‘joy of the shared
peach’ both derive from ancient stories about specific emperors and their
favourites dating back to the sixth century BC, a literary tradition kept alive
for more than two thousand years. ‘Emperor Ai [reigned 6 BC—1 AD] was sleeping
in the daytime with Dong Xian stretched out across his sleeve. When the emperor
wanted to get up, Dong Xian was still asleep. Because he did not want to
disturb him, the emperor cut off his own sleeve and got up.’ This story ‘was
alluded to repeatedly in later literature and gave men of subsequent ages a
means for situating their own desires within an ancient tradition. By seeing
their feelings as passions of the "cut sleeve," they gained a
consciousness of the place of male love in the history of their society’
(Hinsch 1990).
The story of the fickle emperor Duke Ling of Wei (534–493 BC) and
his devoted favourite Mizi Xia was so famous that his very name became a
catchword for homosexuality, and ‘the joy of the half-eaten peach’ became one
of the most frequently used phrases to denote homosexuality in general for more
than two thousand years. ‘Another day Mizi Xia was strolling with the ruler in
an orchard and, biting into a peach and finding it sweet, he stopped eating and
gave the remaining half to the ruler to enjoy. "How sincere is your love
for me!" exclaimed the ruler. "You forgot your own appetite and think
only of giving me good things to eat!"’ (Hinsch 1990).
However, later when
the ruler’s ardour cooled, Mizi Xia was executed for committing some crime
against Duke Ling, who professed not to believe his innocence. ‘"After
all", said the ruler, "he once stole my carriage, and another time he
gave me a half-eaten peach to eat!"’ This is obviously a poetic symbol,
and it seems to me that like all symbols it encapsulates an essence, in this
case the essence of homosexual love. It is also worth noting that the metonym
of the half-eaten peach connotes a generalized eroticism rather than any
specifically active or receptive sexual role, emphasizing the mutual sharing of
the fruits of that love.
The male prostitutes who flourished in late Imperial China were
calledxiaochang, little singers. By the time laws were promulgated to
regulate homosexuality during the Ming dynasty, the legal term for
homosexuality was jijian,
a derogatory term meaning ‘chicken lewdness’, from ji, chicken, and jian, ‘private, secret’, which
may reflect a popular belief about the behaviour of domesticated fowl.
By 1985,
in Taiwan, a long and noble history of poetic metaphors had been replaced by an
exact translation of the most notorious Western euphemism: Bugan shuo chu kou de ai – ‘The love that dare not speak its
name’!
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