Jagose ~Sean's take on it

As I read the first few chapters of Jagose, I began to discover that despite the text being written in 1996, much of Jagose’s theory remains relevant today.  I could not escape the fact that contrary to my model of thought in which I prefer not to place importance in labels, that in order to define a thing, you must label it in one way or another.  Jagose offers definition, and theory regarding the classifications of what is considered the norm and by whom it is considered as such, or for that matter why any of us should care. My favorite line from chapter one states, “Rather than represent queer as unequivocally either progressive or reactionary, this book argues that it does not have any fixed value”. 

In the second chapter, the author speaks of same-sex desire and how it has been theorized (up to the printing of this text).  It seems difficult to accurately describe or label sexuality using simple binary classification. In an effort to define homeosexuality, the word all by itself would have to mean the same to each and every person who encountered the term. Jagose provides excellent illustrations of this model by beginning the chapter with comments from men who have sexual encounters with men, yet fail to see their actions and behaviors as those aligning with homosexuality.  The same can be said of porn stars who are “gay for pay” or men who advertise for sex with other men who label themselves straight and seek other straight males to engage in any number of sexual encounters with. These acts may include mutual masturbation with explicit mention in the ads that there won’t be any “gay stuff here”.

I suspect that it is not the acts that are being denied when these men deny being homosexual, instead it can be numerous reasons including not wanting to become aligned with “gay politics”.

Jagose spends much of chapter two attempting to identify timelines of hetero/homo-sexuality theory.  It seems that although there has been same-sex desire as far back as records can date time, that political posturing, sociological/societal ideals and who is in control (power) of these things, determine how a culture’s people treat the men, women or ________ (fill in the blank as preferred) who happen to desire sexually, those whose bodies are as their own.