Journal of Language and Sexuality - Volume 8, Issue 1, 2019

Abstract

While recent work in sociophonetics has focused on the speech of gay men (Gaudio 1994; Podesva 2007; Podesva, Roberts & Campbell-Kibler 2002), lesbian women (Camp 2009; Van Borsel Vandaele & Corthals 2013), and transgender people (Zimman 2017a), the speech styles of asexual individuals remain understudied. This study analyzes an interview with a graysexual and homoromantic cisgender student at a research university in California, examining the segmental and prosodic characteristics of three voices he uses to construct and position his graysexual identity: a questioning voice, a judgmental voice, and a non-desiring voice. The analysis finds that the questioning voice is characterized by decreased speech rate, high F0, and modal phonation; the judgmental voice, by low F0; and the non-desiring voice, by low F0, narrow F0 range, low intensity, reduced gesture, flat facial expression, and a centralized vowel space. The results emphasize the importance of stylistic reticence to the construction of graysexuality.

Abstract

This paper aims at investigating (1) whether young Thai adults can distinguish between straight male and gay-sounding speech and (2) how listeners feel about speech sounds performed by Thai straight and gay speakers in varying situations in terms of likeability and annoyance. Two experiments were conducted: first, straight males, gay males and females listened to voice stimuli of self-identified straight males and gay males and were asked to identify the sexual orientation of the speakers; second, another three groups of listeners were asked to rate the speakers’ levels of likeability and annoyance using a 5-point Likert scale. The findings indicate that there exist voice characteristics of gay- as opposed to straight-male sounding speech. Regarding the listeners’ perception in relation to speech style in four varying situations, the results indicate that listeners’ perception is not affected by situations in which the speech is delivered.

Abstract

‘New speakers’ refer to people who use a language regularly but are not traditional ‘native’ speakers of that language. Although this discussion has been going on for some time in other sub-disciplines of linguistics, it is more recent in research about European minoritised languages. A feature of discourse around such languages relates to their perceived suitability for diverse urban settings removed from their historical rural heartlands. Irish is an example of a minoritised language which was long associated with conservative rural communities, a reified Catholic discourse of national identity and language ideologies based on nativism. Such an approach not only marginalised urban new speakers of Irish but also exhibited hostility to LGBTQ citizens who did not befit its particular version of Irishness. In this paper, a framework of Critical Sociolinguistics is used to analyse identity positions and ideologies expressed by urban new speakers of Irish who identify as gay and/or queer.

Abstract

Antagonía is Luis Goytisolo’s masterpiece. In this article I present a quantitative and qualitative study of his prose with regards to sexuality. Through an analysis of keywords, concordances, dispersion, and discourses, I show that Antagonía feeds from two historical periods, namely the ending dictatorship and the new democratic transition. Some of its discourses are the product of the Spain of the 1970s and 80s. Among them, we find sexist, male chauvinist, and homophobic discourses latent during those times. Women and queer people are frequently characterized in a negative fashion. However, we also find more subversive discourses that empower women. In sum, I consider Goytisolo’s tetralogy a “fluid” or “transitional” novel in that it is imbued with contradictory discourses rooted in different historical periods.

Abstract

This article explores a specific linguistic intervention ("mild to wild”) that occurs in online communication on gay internet hook up sites. It argues that despite supposed knowledge as to what “mild to wild” means, we must look at this linguistic intervention within specific socio-cultural contexts. Without context, the actual uses and meanings of “mild to wild” might be misunderstood while our knowledge of sexual communities of practice risks falling squarely into stereotypes. For this community of practice, “mild to wild” creates a linguistic opportunity for men interested in having sex with other men to be able to define their desires and further explicate how their sexual interaction will take place while also negotiating expectations and assumptions of male-male sex within increasingly homonormative strictures. Data was gathered from over four years of ethnographic research and is presented from a cultural and anthropological linguistics perspective. The phrase “mild to wild” is used by these men in order to: (1) contest supposed concrete categorizations of sexuality and desire; (2) to create highly contextual intimacies and organizations of desire through online-linguistic interaction; and (3) to alleviate detrimental social effects attached to specific unsafe and variant sex practices. The author argues that this community of practice is an example of how new socialities develop within homonormativities designed to control queer sex and desire.

This article reviews From Drag Queens to Leathermen: Language, Gender and Gay Male Subcultures