Introduction
Language and society are the two phenomena of the objective reality that are interconnected so much that one can not imagine them without each other. Moreover, it is impossible to imagine the world of human beings without these two notions. Why is it so? The answers to the question are multiple. Some people think that society is an artificial thing created by people according to some kind of social agreement. Others stick to the point of view according to which people descended from animals, namely from monkeys, and society became a logical stage of their development. Other people support the theory that was developed by the scientists of Ancient Greece.
This theory states that human beings are animal species but their main difference from other species is that they are “social” animals, i. e. the society and social life are the obligatory conditions of their existence. Language is one of the basic elements for the existence of every society or community, and the gay community is not an exception here. Language, although a special one, is a fundamental basis over which this community is built, and we are going to see this in the current paper (Danesi, 2004).
Basic Principles of Social Life
It is evident that every kind of union of animals must be based upon certain principles and ideas. In human society, the aims are different from those of other animals species, thus the basic principles upon which the society is built are different as well. It is widely accepted that the coexistence of human beings is possible to the gift of communication of humans with each other. So, communication and all its means, verbal as well as non-verbal, are the fundamental basis for the existence of human society.
And communication would be impossible without language, so we can state that language is the basis for any kind of coexistence of human beings, and society is the highest stage of the development of this coexistence (Hajek, 2005). Needless to say, that society is divided into numerous small groups that are gathered around certain interests, ideals, sometimes geographical factors, or belonging to a certain profession, race, or religion.
All these social groups have their own means of communication with each other and inside of themselves. Thus, even different social groups from one and the same geographical region can have different means of communication, correspondently different languages or variants of the same language. They create certain words, attribute absolutely new meanings to the already existing words and turn the act of communication into an event the sense of which can be understood only by the members of this or that community (Danesi, 2004).
One of the social groups that have formed and now use their specific language are people with different sexual orientations, i. e. gays, and lesbians. This very essay should deal with the issues concerning the specific points that are present in the speech of gay men. That is why here we are going to consider only the aspects of speech of gays as developed by these people in order to communicate with each other more easily.
Very often, especially in the past years, these people were considered to be the outcasts of the society and had to create a special means of communication, i. e. a special language in order to hide their belonging to gays and not to become victims of some kind of violence. In many countries, gay relationships and, especially gay marriages were banned by law and people who were accused of them were punished by imprisonment. Such cases could be observed in such countries as the USSR, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and others.
But with the course of time, the social attitude towards gays changed, their relations became socially accepted, although not in all societies, and gay marriages are the new freedom that democracies present to people (Halperin, 2007). But still, the necessity of the special language that would serve the purposes of communication between the members of this very social group in different situations was present. So, the special language called “Gayspeak” or “Gaybonics” was constructed and started its functioning in the gay community (Baker, 2002).
Argot, Jargon, Slang
All the variants of a language that are created and widely used by a certain social group of people for the purposes of hiding the messages of their communication are called argot, jargon, and slang. The difference between these notions lies in the nature of the social groups that use this or that linguistic phenomenon. According to this criterion, argot is the secret language used in the criminal sphere by the members of different gangs in order to conceal their activities from those who do not take part in their gangs. Jargon is any kind of language created by a certain professional community in order to make communication easier and to bring a bit of secret to it.
And, finally, slang is considered to be any kind of violation of standard language norms, irrespective of profession. It is typically used by members of different social groups, namely age and sex groups that often resort to the usage of some words that can not be met in the speech of representatives of other groups, thus Gaybonics can be referred to as slang of the gay community (Hajek, 2005):
- Cherry – anal sex for the first time;
- Diva – woman or admirer of a woman;
- Slave – a gay man who prefers to be led around and humiliated during a sexual intercourse.
“Gayspeak” or “Gaybonics”
This language appeared in times when people with different sexual orientations had to find their belonging to this group of society. The name “Gaybonics” appeared as an allusion to the slang of the African American citizens of the United States who also constructed their own language to communicate easily and in secret. Their language was called “Ebonics” which was derived from the word used to indicate the black wood in English – “ebony”. Thus Gaybonics became an analog to the “Ebonics” that was used in a different social group (Baker, 2005).
As a means of communication, Gaybonics possesses a number of functions and has crucial importance for the gay community. The main functions of Gaybonics are the following:
- communicative function;
- identifying function;
- secret function;
- social function.
Now, let us consider all four of these functions in more detail to understand better their meaning and usefulness for the gay community.
So, the first and probably the most important function of Gaybonics is the communicative one. According to this function, Gaybonics is a means of communication between the members of the gay community in different situations. It can be used by gay men in informal talks with their friends and members of the same community. Also, Gaybonics is a helpful means of hiding information in situations when gays do not want the public to know their belonging to the gay community. For example, if the situation takes place in a public place that is not constructed for gays only, and people can misinterpret the actions of this or that representative of the gay community if they find out that he is gay (Cage, 2005):
– Gurl, you are ready to go? (Where “gurl” is a kind of address used by gays in everyday speech)
Here, the identifying function of Gaybonics comes into play being closely connected to the communicative function that it fulfills. This function is carried out when the people from the gay community need to identify if the person they met is gay or not. Gaybonics operates with a set of devices, lexical units, and intonation patterns that can not be confused with anything else by the person who knows Gaybonics. Also, it operates with a set of Phraseological units that are typical for the representatives of the gay community.
Of course, these lexical units, as well as Phraseological units and intonation patterns, can be used in a number of other situations in the life of people who are not gays and, in this case, it is somewhat difficult to find out to which community this or that person belongs. But gay men can detect the persons belonging to their community due to certain phrases that seem to have no sense if used out of the context, and this context is known only by “initiates”, i. e. to the representatives of the gay community (Laughery, 1999):
– And you are telling me this because? (The grammar and intonation is typical for gays, so thus they can identify each other)
Speaking about the secret function of Gaybonics, it is evident as well as in any other kind of artificially created languages that are used in a certain community only. The very purpose of the creation of such languages is to encode the information that the representatives of a certain community do not want to become widely known in public. In the case of Gaybonics, the aim of this very language is to prevent the exposure of a certain person’s belonging to the gay community if this person does not want to demonstrate this belonging or the situation does not favor this demonstration. For example, if gays meet somewhere outside their traditional places of meeting, sometimes they have to hide their sexual orientation, due to some prejudice that still exists in the society or some kinds of violence that can occur against them.
And, finally, the fourth function of Gaybonics is a social function. This very function is directed at creating and preserving the social institution which in the case considered in this essay is the gay community. These words mean that every social group, community, or institution demands a certain basis for its foundation, and in the majority of cases this role is played by a language. In the gay community, Gaybonics fulfills the function of the basic element because all other levels of this community, namely culture, art, literature, politics, and others, are erected on the basis of language.
Culture and different arts as their manifestations are the material reflection of language in all its aspects. There are a lot of demonstrations of gay achievements in literature, science, and music. The latest example of this is the creative and charitable activity of the famous British singer and composer Sir Elton John.
Besides, the social function of Gaybonics helps to construct and develop the inner structure of the gay community by means of creating the air of belonging to “a secret men’s club” with its own rules, traditions, and even its own language. This all makes the gay community more powerful and allows it to fight for the rights of people with different sexual orientations in a great number of countries all over the world. The language of Gaybonics is a rather specific matter but it has become a fundamental basis for the gay culture as the manifestation of the existence of the gay community (Stevenson, 2006).
Change in Gaybonics
As well as every other linguistic phenomenon, the language of Gaybonics has developed with the gay community in which it is used as a means of communication. The changes that have happened in the course of its development are connected with the new achievements in the fight for equal rights for gays, and concern all the levels of the language, including lexical, phonetic, phraseological, and grammatical levels. The changes in Gaybonics started when the situation and the social attitude towards sexual minorities changed for the better and when gay relationships were legalized. The examples of changes in the phraseology of Gybonics are the following set-expressions:
- Not straight, “gayly forward”;
- “Save the drama for your momma”;
- I’m not gay, but my boyfriend is. (Baker, 2002)
The lexical level of Gaybonics also experienced considerable changes during its development and was greatly influenced by the movement in support of the political correctness and usual politeness in the society. The examples of changes at the lexical level are numerous, and here are some of them. Let us at first consider the words that are not used anymore in Gaybonics due to the expansion of new lexical units which are considered to be modern and reflect the reality of the gay community better. Such words are not used as:
- Virgin – a gay man who has no sexual experience yet;
- Hayley!!! – a greeting typical in the gay community;
- Monogamy – a state when a gay man always has one partner.
On the contrary, the following lexical units have been introduced to Gaybonics as the reflection of the influence of time and progress that was achieved in respect of rights for gay people:
- Dyke Daddy – a gay man who has certain relations with lesbians and cleans the house for them;
- Top – a gay man that prefers an active position during sexual intercourse;
- Bottom – a gay man that prefers a passive position during sexual intercourse; (Baker, 2002)
Conclusion
All the above-considered data allows us to make a logical conclusion of the current essay. The essay aimed at finding out the basic functions of the language specially created for use in the gay community – Gaybonics. We tried to find out the main functions of Gaybonics, as well as understand its importance and impact upon the development of the gay community and gay culture. The main focus of the essay was on the linguistic aspect of Gaybonics and its influence upon society.
As a result of the study, we managed to find out that Gaybonics is the basis for the gay community as any other language becomes a basis of the society of human beings. The main functions of this language are communicative, identifying, secret and social functions that help develop the gay community and acquire new rights and freedoms for people with different sexual orientations. We also managed to trace the changes that happened in the language of the gay community during its development. These changes touched all levels of the language, including phonetic, lexical, phraseological, and grammatical levels, which has been demonstrated by several examples that show the changes that took place in the Gaybonics.
Works Cited
Baker, P. Polari – The Lost Language of Gay Men (Routledge Studies In linguistics). Routledge; 1 edition, 2002.
Baker, P. Public Discourses of Gay Men That’s So Gay (Routledge Advances in Corpus Linguistics). Routledge; 1 edition, 2005.
Cage, K. Gayle: The Language of Kinks and Queens, A History and Dictionary of Gay Language in South Africa. Jacana Media, 2005.
Danesi, M. A Basic Course in Anthropological Linguistics (Studies in Linguistic and Cultural Anthropology). Canadian Scholars Press, 2004.
Hajek, C. Intergroup communication schemas: Cognitive representations of talk with gay men [An article from: Language and Communication] [HTML]. Elsevier, 2005.
Halperin, D. What Do Gay Men Want?: An Essay on Sex, Risk, and Subjectivity. University of Michigan Press, 2007.
Loughery, J. The Other Side of Silence: Men’s Lives & Gay Identities – A Twentieth-Century History. Holt Paperbacks, 1999.
Stevenson, T. Sons of the Church: The Witnessing of Gay Catholic Men. Routledge; 1 edition, 2006.