#type: definition

[a-gay-a-day]

Bulldagger

Bulldagger - Most often used in a derogatory way to describe a masculine lesbian; most often used in African American communities.

Bulldagger: Bulldagger is pejorative slang for a very masculine lesbian, which often carries a more racialized meaning than its synonyms bulldyke, bulldiker, and diesel dyke. Bulldaggers are associated with physical strength, sexual prowess, emotional reserve, and butch chivalry.

These are two different definitions of this word, given by two different sources. The word bulldagger has its roots in 1920′s Harlem, specifically in the African-american blues community. This word was used to mean lesbian, but since gender was much less defined and separate from sexuality at this point, the word was also associated with individuals that we would consider “trans” from our modern perspective. 

From SDiane Adamz-bogus: “The Black Bulldagger is a link to our ancient and recent Black woman-loving past, and the predecessor of today's Black lesbian. She is a character, an idea, a woman who loved women but was heavily male-identified more often than not. She was the unattractive girl, the tomboyish teen, the independent woman, or any Black sister who repulsed the advances of men.”

[a-gay-a-day]

Neopronouns

Neopronouns linguistically means “new pronouns,” which is exactly what neopronouns are: new pronouns, created for a world that does not have adequate language to discuss gender non-conformity. Though we tend to think of neopronouns, and thus, our conception of gender, as extremely modern, the first recorded use of neopronouns was in 1789. The pronouns Thon/Tho were added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary in 1934, but dropped due to lack of use in 1961. (As an aside, the Mercian-Webster officially recognizes they as a singular pronoun and states that it’s been grammatically correct since 1300. Take that, bigots.)

The oldest suspected rather than recorded use of a neopronouns traces back to the 1200s, and Middle English in which “ou” was used, and the pronouns E/Em/Eir were used in online communities in the 1990s.

This pdf explains how to use neopronouns. The page pronouns.org, which works to create a better understanding of the usage of all pronouns states: “If someone shares their pronouns with you, it’s meant to disrupt the culture of making assumptions, and to provide you with the information you need in order to refer to them appropriately.”

[a-gay-a-day]

Loveless Aromanticism

Aromanticism is still a relatively new topic in the queer community. As such, it is very hard to find scholarly sources on aromanticism. This post consists of three definitions of loveless aromantics, and then my personal definition, being somewhat connected to that identity myself. 

One explanation of this is “Some people do not feel, understand, or connect with love – any form of it. They may identify as “Loveless”, which originated in the aromantic community as a way of reclaiming something often seen as a negative trait.”

Another definition is “Loveless Aro describes someone who is on the aromantic spectrum that is in some way disconnected from the concept of love, does not feel love, may doubt that they feel love, or rejects the idea of experiencing love.”

In an interview with some loveless aromantics, Santelmo, one of the people interviewed, said “Every loveless aro labels themself as loveless for different reasons, no one with it has the same reasons for doing so. That and saying things like ‘love isn't inherently romantic’ and ignoring the fact that society made it out so that love is inherently romantic.”

As someone who identifies with the term loveless aromatic, my definition is as follows: It is the unwillingness to label any strong positive feelings as love, due to the connotations presented in the word love by our modern society.

My personal reasons for identifying with this term are the same reasons that I prefer it/it’s pronouns: linguistical accuracy. As someone quite interested in language, I cannot use the term love without comparing it to its linguistical predecessors, all of which primarily were used to mean lust. While this is not everyone's reason for identifying as such, it is my own. 

[a-gay-a-day]

Club 82

As most queer clubs were, Club 82 was run by the mafia. Specifically, it was run by the Genovese crime family. The club was extravagant and the shows were often filled with over-the-top outfits and performances.(The source I provided there is super cool, I would recommend taking a look).

The night club was shut down in 1953 along with other queer nightclubs in Greenwich village, due to the rumors of it being run by the mafia, which rumors were, in fact, started by the wife of the owner of the club. It faced license loss because of this. Mrs. Genovese also filed for divorce after making these accusations. (The source for this information is also terribly interesting. It's a newspaper clipping, I would recommend checking it out.)

Though the nightclub employed primarily queer performers, it was patronized by many heterosexuals, looking for novelty in their nightlives. A program of the club is provided here.

(The Wikipedia page for Club 82 could use some additional information. Putting that out there for anyone here who enjoys editing Wikipedia, as I don't currently have time.)

[a-gay-a-day]

Drag Balls

The ballroom scene was a Latino, African-American, and queer subculture that emerged in the late 1800s. These balls were typically a response to drag pageants, which had judge panels consisting of mostly white people. Though there is a significant amount to be said about the rules in drag balls, and the way drag balls were run, I would like to talk about the impact that these drag balls had on history and culture. 

However, houses were an important part of drag balls. These houses would consist of a found family, usually between black queer people, typically transgender who were in need of support. These houses would win prizes and participate in drag balls. People would typically forgo their own last name and take upon them the name of their house. 

The first known drag ball was at the Hamilton lodge, and it was held during a time where segregation was still upheld in the USA. The ball itself was integrated, but racism was still present, and all of the judges were white. Therefore, only white people won these competitions. This racism spurred the non-white community to hold balls of their own, which quickly became more prominent than the white-run drag balls. 

[a-gay-a-day]

Cottaging

Cottaging, also known as tea-rooming, was a term used to describe gay men having sex in public restrooms. It originated from the fact that restrooms used to look like small blocky cottages. It became not only slang, but a well-known double entendre and even entered into polari.

This term was used in the 1900s before the gay liberation movement as a discreet means for gay people to find people willing to have sex, but is more recent than one might think. In 2008, a bathroom was closed for fear that it was being used for gay sex. (I will add that the sources for this post are fascinating and I would encourage you all to look more at them.)

[a-gay-a-day]

Queer

Queer first came into use in English in the 16th century, and was used to describe something odd, strange, or differing from socially appropriate behavior. It eventually came to describe sexual deviance, and in the 19th century, the word was used to describe men who were thought to be in same-sex relationships, or men who acted effeminately. 

In the 1950s to 1970s, where the word homophile was being relaced with the commonly seen today gay, the word queer was primarily used to describe men who participated in anal or oral sex acts.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, the words queer, fairy and gay were all used to describe different subcultures. While fairy was used for feminine men, gay was used for flamboyant men, and queer was used for stereotypical masculine men. 

Later into the 1900s, gay was adopted to mean assimilationist homosexuals,  rejecting femininity and conforming to the normativity of the time while being gay. In the 1940s, gay men began to chastise elders who still referred to themselves as queer, asserting that queer was an unacceptable identity within homosexual society. (at least in America. Queer was used in England with less pushback during this time.)

In the 1980s, the LGBT community began to reclaim the word queer from its previously pejorative use. Groups such as Queer Nation began to actively use the word to describe themselves and within their self-identification of the community. Queer Nation says this about their use of the word queer:  “ Well, yes, "gay" is great. It has its place. But when a lot of lesbians and gay men wake up in the morning we feel angry and disgusted, not gay. So we've chosen to call ourselves queer. Using "queer" is a way of reminding us how we are perceived by the rest of the world.”

In the early 2000s, people of color began to reclaim the word queer. In the later 2000s, queer began to be a term used by LGBT people resisting the idea of assimilation into wider society. Though there is much more history, behind this word, this history is still happening, and most gay or queer people know of what is called “queer discourse” in the community. Who knows how this history will be read in the future? 

[a-gay-a-day]

Roman sexuality

While we today conceptualize queer as homosexual sex, different parts of history had different cultural norms, and there were many ways to be strange and off-putting in sexuality. In roman society sexuality was seen through the lens of power, and as per our modern view, femininity was looked down upon.

One way in which we conceptualize Roman sexuality nowadays is through the teratogenic grid (Pictured above). This divides sex into six different roles: There are active and passive roles (Which I suppose are formed either by adding an -are to the end of the verb or an -i) (Sorry, that was a dumb joke about latin grammar), and there are three different orifices to be penetrated. You may notice that Latin has different words to correspond to each persons role in each specific sex act. Sex without a penis was not considered when discussing roman sexuality. 

Another thing to be aware of is that romans were not as open to the concept of pederasty as Greeks were. However, their ideas of sex were still based on a system of power and on one partner taking a passive role. Equality in sex was not something normalized.