LGBT or LGBTIHQQBDSMXYZ History Month?

This is the fifth in History Matters’ series of blogs on LGBT History. All of the blogs will appear here as they are posted.

So LGBT History Month is over. Ironically, if we take this month seriously (by doing some history) we actually learn that we should be taking its name with a pinch of salt. 

LGBT History started out with the G. That is, post-war narratives tend to centre on gay men: both negative attention and emancipatory activism, landmarked by the Stonewall riots in 1969, has focused largely on male nightlife. As the gay liberation movement developed, gradually the L was added, for example in Lesbian and Gay History Month, celebrated in the USA since 1994. Later on, the ensemble was completed with a B and a T. Surely, this covers all bases, institutions like LGBT History Month seem to suggest.

But it would only be fair to continue adding letters: if we have a T for trans*-people (transgenders, transexuals, cross-dressers...), why not add an I for intersex? After all, the T focuses on gender identity rather than sexual preference. If we include the lives and struggles of people who are crossing the gender binary, than surely we should include those of people who move somewhere in between? And why not also include a B, a D, an S and an M to include other kinds of marginalised practices? [1] And how about the H that is sometimes included in southern Asia to represent hijras? (Hijra identity is sometimes called a third gender.)

Hijra communities are in fact a good example of how culturally specific all these gender/sexual identities are, and therefore how hard it is to subsume them under the Euro-American post-Stonewall denominations used in global activism. Activists worldwide quite understandably employ these denominations in order to have a language to speak in, not least to reach financial donors in the west. But I fear that such names do not much help the cause of people suffering under post-colonial governments which picture, for example, homosexuality as an intrusive western ‘lifestyle’. [2]

Nor are these terms always equally appropriate within western history itself. As Helen Smith noted in an earlier post, early-20 -century men who had sex with men did not necessarily call themselves ‘gay’ or ‘homosexual’. [3] The same can be found in other historical instances. In Plato’s Symposion, for example, two different characters each describe men who love men as being more masculine (as well as being more intellectually creative) than men who love women. The latter are the androgynous ones. This differs markedly from popular perceptions about gay men nowadays. [4] A quite different example again are the ‘sodomites’ we encounter in high-medieval penitentials. These ‘sodomites’ could be defined by their having anal sex with women, as well as men. And how about the category of medieval mystics who, in their erotic poems, desired nothing more than a spiritual unity with Christ? If we want to take this huge cultural and historical diversity into account, we might end up with a whole lot of identity categories – a whole lot of letters.

Some rightly question this explosion of compartmentalised identifications and call themselves ‘queer’. Yet in many quarters this has only led to the addition of an extra letter to the alphabet. This leaves the English-speaking world with a host of LGBTIQQ societies. That last Q, of course, stands for ‘questioning’. Which is perhaps what we should be doing. For to narrow down our adolescence to the choosing of a letter (including an S for ‘straight’) can surely not be the most liberating thing.

And yet, I would not want LGBT History Month to go away.

A question that has occasionally been asked to me since becoming involved in this topic is why gay people feel the need to flock together in special bars and pride parades – which implies the question: why is there a separate LGBT History Month?

The answer may be obvious to anyone with alternative tastes in anything: you need such places to find what you are looking for (in this case it may be anything from conversation to romance or sex) and feel normal (need I say: in a special way). It is the burden of the marginalised that their tastes are not taken for granted and need to be specially signaled. In that sense, a gay bar does not differ much from a Comic Con.

These places thus fulfil an important function, as does this History Month. But it should not be forgotten that this function is largely political. By forming a group and setting themselves visibly apart, people command recognition for their existence. What is more, people find safety and comfort in group identities. These reasons make people identify as, for example, ‘British’ or ‘steel worker’, just as they may make them assume gender identities like ‘woman’ or ‘drag queen’; or sexual identities such as ‘dyke’ or ‘married’ (although soon this will no longer be an exclusively heterosexual identity in England: the first same-sex weddings are to take place in March). However diverse sexual and gender behaviours and feelings may be, the fact that people classify themselves and others is universally human. [5]

If we limit ourselves to such categories, however, we limit our imagination. Besides constricting ourselves, these categories create antagonisms and make it harder to empathise with others. Let this History Month be an opportunity, not just for people who call themselves LGBT, but for everyone, to learn from historical diversity and consider their own choices in life and place in society.