Neologisms and Morphological Analysis of Gay Language

The first word that comes to my mind that is used differently with my friends than it was used by my parents is the word gay. In this day and time, the word gay is used to describe a person who is interested in the same gender. When my parents were growing up, being gay meant that someone was happy. The second word that comes to my mind that is used differently with my friends than it was used by my parents

As Gloria Anzaldúa moves forward with the cultural dealings of homophobic ideas, we learn more of her fear of being rejected. Some groups may conform to the norms to be accepted in a culture, which we see often in the United States when dealing simply with immigration and assimilation, but there are

The word “gay” has gone through drastic changes. Traditionally, it was a positive term that meant to be “happily excited” or “jolly” (Merriam Webster, “Gay”). It was used regularly to express one’s feelings about life. Today, it has a far different meaning. Now people use the word gay to label homosexuals, those with feminine qualities, or those who do something thought to be outside of the norm for their gender. “Being gay” went from expressing someone’s happiness to describing his sexual preference. The definition of gay has changed so much that its original meaning has become archaic and lost to the times.

The similarity gives them a consistent understanding amongst each other of acceptable qualities and actions for masculinity. Peers reinforce each other’s notions of what is masculine. Riofrio discusses this as “their own vision of masculinity, a hyper-masculinity hopelessly disconnected from reality and selfish in a way that only adolescent machismo allows.” (27) At the least, the narrator has a close bond of friendship to Beto. There is a possibility he has sexual attraction to him as well. He knows this is unacceptable among his peer group. He witnesses his friends taunt homosexuals. His peer group uses derogatory slang when referring to homosexuals. If the narrator were forthcoming to his peer group about his confused, bisexual, or homosexual feelings, they would not have open minds and offer support and understanding. He would face taunting, ridicule, and possibly acts of aggression. “The pressures that motivate men-especially Latino men-to act irrationally in matters of love and affection” cause them to resort to a “scripted “how-to” instructions to guide him rather than allowing his emotions to dictate his actions” (Gonzalez 46) Under the pressure of fitting in with his peer group, the narrator has become a slave to their ideal instead of living his own truth. Gonzalez reiterates that the narrator “cannot pursue relationships on their own terms rather than society’s terms.” It would be very stifling to live under that

This paper will continue on, researching the societal change/acceptance in the gay and lesbian community as no longer being unorthodox and with the stigma coming from the gay community itself.

I will be writing about George Chauncey’s Gay New York. In this text, George Chauncey seeks to restore that world to history, to chart its geography, and to recapture its culture and politics by challenging three widespread myths about the history of gay life before the rise of the gay movement. These include the myths of isolation, invisibility and internalization. The homosexual community is considered a subculture to the heterosexual community, which identifies as the dominant culture. George Chauncey wants to know why the dominant heterosexual culture often misinterprets the heterosexual subculture. He also talks about the assumptions the dominant culture carries about sexuality and culture. I believe there are two reasons the dominant culture misinterprets and make assumptions about the homosexual community; these two reasons consist of religious beliefs and social stigma of the dominant culture towards the subculture.

In the article “Core Values and the Identity-Supportive Classroom: Setting LGBTQ Issues within Wider Frameworks for Preservice Educators” by Michael Sadowski, Sadowski discusses the issues and research on LGBTQ+ in education and a school environment. He focuses on both the students’ and teachers’ behavior towards LGBTQ+ situations. For students, more often than not, there are many forms of verbal harassment that take place such as slurs and derogatory language. For teachers, it is the lack of intervention when this harassment takes place, “38.6 % of the students…indicated that their teachers never intervened when they hear students use homophobic language…44% indicated that teachers intervened only ‘sometimes’.”

This article talks about both the pervasiveness of homophobia, characterized as "a bias that prompts scorn and segregation toward lesbian and gay individuals" (Croteau and Kusek, 1992, p. 396), and a particular approach to diminish homophobia—gay and lesbian speaker boards. Gay and lesbian speaker boards are board presentations by gay and lesbian individuals, whereby they share their own encounters, stories, and take part in a dialog with the gathering of people. Croteau and Kusek (1992) talk about six past studies that looked into techniques to abatement homophobia, with some using different sorts of speaker boards. Albeit methodological shortcomings are recognized in the exploration, 5 out of the 6 ponders presumed that homophobia can be

The authors, researchers in this article acknowledged the different rates of homelessness in homosexuals and heterosexuals. However, their main focus is how it relates or apply to middle school students. Researchers used representative data, examining sexual identity and homelessness among Los Angeles Unified School District middle school students. They were also able to use

Homosexuality Annotated Bibliography Adriaens, Pieter R., and Andreas De Block. “The Evolution of a Social Construction: the Case of Male Homosexuality.” Scholarly Journals, vol. 49, ser. 4, University Press, 2006, pp. 570–585.

The social group of gay men in America remains one of the most debated in sociological and political discourse. Homosexuality has long been a neglected topic in social sciences but since 1970s, it has become a fruitful filed of research. Gay men in the US have long been an unprotected social group that being afraid of discrimination and violence preferred to live in the shadow. However, over the last decade, the life of gay men in the US has undergone the significant changes and it is important to trace the historical progression towards the current situation with the attitudes toward this group in society and the legal rights it has. The aim of this research is to study the social group of gay men in the US focusing on its history, the statistics of its population in the country, the privileges it has and the oppression it

In order to answer the first question, I tried to think about a language-related controversy that most people have heard about. The first thing that popped into my mind was the stereotypical “gay accent,” and whether it is a choice, or something that men do not have control over. I also want to look at how the “gay accent” aligns with one’s true sexual orientation. I just recently watched the documentary film entitled “Do I Sound Gay,” and thought that it would be an interesting topic to discuss. The “gay accent” or the “gay lisp” is a large part of our culture. When most Americans hear characteristics of the “gay accent” in someone’s speech, that person is usually tagged as being homosexual without any other knowledge of the person.

G.|Greytak, Joseph, et al. “The 2015 National School Climate Survey: The Experiences of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Youth in Our Nation's Schools.”Center for Civic Innovation, Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017. Tel: 212-599-7000; Fax: 212-599-3494; Web Site: Http://Www.manhattan-Institute.org, 30 Nov. 2015, eric.ed.gov/?id=ED574780.

Sociology surrounds every aspect of life, from birth to death. Throughout history, different demographics have had to fight for their rights to be recognized as equal to white males. From the acquisition of blacks right to vote to the women’s rights movement our society is slowly progressing to a state of equality. One demographic that has been in the news lately is the homosexual community seeking rights to legally marry. A multitude of sociological concepts can be applied to topic of homosexuality in America. Topics ranging from the Functionalist theory to Marxism and ethnocentrism to subculture can all provide insight to the homosexual culture in America.

I have chosen the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender culture (LGBT), more specifically, the Gay culture as my study in intercultural communication. My person of contact is a 21-year-old homosexual male by the name of Scott Gardner. Scott identifies himself as gay but more specifically a panromantic homosexual; meaning, he is sexually attracted to men, but romantically attracted to all genders.