'Color Him Black': Erotic Representations and the Politics of Race in West German Homosexual Magazines, 1949-1974.

This piece analyzes the tensions between racial liberalism and erotic representations in West German homosexual-oriented magazines between 1949 and 1974. Relying primarily on publications such as Der Kreis, Die Insel/Der Weg, Amigo, and Du & Ich, this paper argues that as white West German homosexua...

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Publicado en:Sexuality & Culture Vol. 21; no. 2; pp. 382 - 404
Autor principal: Ewing, Christopher
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Springer Nature Jun2017
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Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
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        au: Ewing, Christopher
        affil: The Graduate Center, CUNY , 52-33 Metropolitan Ave, Apt 2R Ridgewood 11385 USA
      su:
        Gay people
        Race
        Erotica
        LGBTQ+ people
        Sexual minorities
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          Gay people
          Race
          Erotica
          LGBTQ+ people
          Sexual minorities
      keyword:
        Gay life in West Germany
        History of race
        History of sexuality
        Minority politics
        West German history
      ab: This piece analyzes the tensions between racial liberalism and erotic representations in West German homosexual-oriented magazines between 1949 and 1974. Relying primarily on publications such as Der Kreis, Die Insel/Der Weg, Amigo, and Du & Ich, this paper argues that as white West German homosexual men made a case for the end of legal discrimination and for social acceptance, they often constructed their arguments and identity as a persecuted minority in relation to the struggles and imagined experiences of colonized men and racial minorities. At the same time, however, many homosexual men still maintained a set of assumptions about racial difference that exoticized and essentialized men of color, assumptions that are particularly apparent in the erotic representations (both visual and literary) of men of color that appeared in these magazines. I further argue that, although historians of homosexuality in West Germany have traditionally viewed 1969 as a break, due to the radical changes in gay life that followed the 1969 reform of the anti-sodomy statute, the tensions between racial liberalism and exoticization continued well into the 1970s and in a remarkably similar published format. The contradictions within these magazines add to the growing literature on both homosexuality and race in postwar West Germany. Through the close examination of a medium that was crucial to the formation of homosexual communities and the development reformist politics, we can more fully understand the complexities and tensions on which minority politics were built in the wake of fascism.
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    language: English
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