The Best Little Boy in the World

Disidentification in the Production of Black Gay Male Subjectivity1

Bibliographic Data

ID2292172
AuthorsChristopher S Chambers (0009-0003-6316-4643, Providence College, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume94
Issue4
Pages787-806
Publication date2024-11-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSociological Inquiry (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0038-0245 • E-ISSN: 1475-682X
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/soin.12588
OpenAlexW4389246083
LanguageEN
References cited55

This article examines how Black gay men produce identities in correspondence with cultural scripts of Black manhood. I illustrate how these scripts organize a subjectivity shaped by white supremacy and signify racial consciousness, respectability, and commitment to Black antiracism. The script intentionally excludes queer men. Instead, Black queer men are 'faggots,' a subjectivity signifying weakness, wasted manhood, and capitulation to whiteness. Utilizing Muñoz's (1999, Disidentifications: Queers of Color and the Performance of Politics, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis) concept of disidentification, I track how participants engage in a reimagining of the conventional script of heteronormative Black masculinity to embody a subjectivity I call Super Black Man. This hybrid subjectivity responds to interlocking systems of race, sexuality, and gender in their lives by locating space in conventional Black male subjectivities for Black gay men. As Super Black Men, participants accomplished identities that did not compromise their self-expression or affiliation with Black communities. I discuss how disidentification adds analytic complexity to this empirical investigation of Black gay men's identity work. What results is a more robust understanding of how race shapes the motives, trajectory, and outcomes of racialized sexual identities

Aesthetics · Art · Epistemology · Identity (music) · Masculinity · Queer · Sociology · Subjectivity · White (mutation) · African Sexualities and LGBTQ+ Issues · Gender Studies · LGBTQ Health, Identity, and Policy · Social and Cultural Dynamics

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