Failing Homonationalism? Gay Israeli Eurovision Geeks Negotiating Nationalism and Masculinity.

In 2019, the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) was hosted in Tel Aviv. Like other national contests such as the Olympics or the FIFA World Cup, the ESC is a political event. For gay Israeli men who are ESC fans, this was an opportunity to become more integrated in the gay and national communities through homonormativity and homonational processes. However, as this case study shows, Israeli gay men ESC fans mostly rejected homonational masculinity in favor of a counterhegemonic identification, self-characterized as "ESC geeks." In that, they adhered to their marginal space and adopted a subversive queer perspective. Analytically, this means that homonationalism should not be considered a political form of normalizing power that is accessible to all gay men. Rather, it is a process that produces manifold, including queer practices, and it can no longer be seen as accessible to all LGBTs, or as something into which LGBTs are duped.

The Gay Right: A Framework for Understanding Right Wing LGBT Organizations.

While there has been considerable interest in debates about right wing ideas in LGBT movements-military service, marriage, nationalism, white supremacy-there has been comparatively little attention to self-proclaimed right wing LGBT organizations, what I call the "gay right." Social theory to date offers a fragmented set of theoretical tools to explain them, including homonationalism, post-gay identity, additive intersectionality, and systems justification theory. I propose a two axis framework to unify these theories and map wide ranging diversity within the gay right. This framework is based on both a review of existing theories, and also analysis of 38 gay right organizations in 14 countries. I illustrate the framework with an extended analysis of three gay-right organizations which share a context-the contemporary UK-but have very different politics.

Queer Relationalities, Impossible: The Politics of Homonationalism and Failure in LOGO's Fire Island.

This essay interrogates the representation of "hot mess" gay male castmates and their interpersonal relationships in LOGO's Fire Island's season 1. In particular, this essay identifies moments of media constructed queer failure through which the gay male castmates are framed, not to politicize, historicize, and contextualize their interpersonal relations as possibly emerging forms of queer relationalities. In so doing, this essay overall critiques how LOGO's Fire Island is a material product of homonationalism that colorblinds the hetero-relational paradigm as the normative social capital. The analysis is consisting of three themes; heterosexualization, whiteness, and respectability. In the end, this essay discusses the broader implications of queer relationalities that Fire Island's season one has failed to offer.

Inhabiting the state subjunctively: Transgender life-making alongside death and a pandemic.

The Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, while addressing the United Nations General Assembly on 26 September 2020, stated that India had introduced legal reforms to accord rights to transgender citizens. Even though there is not much material basis to these rights, transgender communities have been protesting against the state and at times negotiating with it to get laws that are more in alignment with their rights. In the wake of serialised deaths and precarity intensified by the Covid-19 pandemic, transgender communities also stage other negotiations in the everyday with activists, transnationally funded NGOs and academics researching their communities, encounters that are not as spectacular as the protests against the state, but that which ensures their daily sustenance. This paper investigates how they inhabit these systemically violent institutions. Deploying ethnographic field notes from eastern India, this paper argues that they inhabit them subjunctively, which is not about refusing engagement with what is oppressive but about the ceaseless conjuring of improvisatory and contingent gestures that are marked by hope as well as uncertainty. The simultaneity of protests, rage, hopelessness, hope, negotiations, supplications and scepticism allow them to not only endure the violence of institutions but also to rupture them and imagine them otherwise.

La articulación del racismo y la homofobia en los valores de la población europea / The articulation of racism and homophobia in the values of the European population

Racismo y homofobia representan dos grandes desafíos para las sociedades contemporáneas. El síndrome de enemistad grupal (SEG) y el homonacionalismo representan dos conceptos, apa-rentemente opuestos, para la comprensión de la relación entre racismo y homofobia. En este artículo analizamos esta relación en los valores de la población de Austria, Francia, España y Holanda, a partir de los datos de la European Values Study2017. Empleamos el método de la tipología estructural y articulada, con análisis de correspondencias y un análisis de clasifica-ción. Nuestros resultados confirman parcialmente la adecuación, tanto del SEG como del ho-monacionalismo, para explicar la relación entre el racismo y la homofobia. Por un lado, el ra-cismo resultó más elevado que la homofobia en todos los grupos. Por el otro, obtuvimos un grupo moderadamente racista y poco homófobo, otro racista y homófobo y sólo en un grupo muy minoritario se visualizaron tendencias hacia una sociedad genuinamente inclusiva. (AU)

Social research has identified racism and homophobia as two of the great challenges for con-temporary societies. The syndrome of group focused enmity (SGE) and homonationalism repre-sent two apparently opposite concepts in understanding the relationship between racism and homophobia. In this article we analyse this relationship considering the values of the popula-tion of Austria, France, Spain, and the Netherlands, based on data from the European Values Study 2017. We use the method of structural and articulated typology, with analysis of corre-spondences and classification analysis. Our results lead us to partially confirm the adequacy of both SEG and homonationalism to explain the relationship between racism and homophobia. On the one hand, racism was higher than homophobia in all groups. On the other hand, we ob-tained a moderately racist and slightly homophobic group, another racist and homophobic group and only in a very minority group tendencies towards a genuinely inclusive society were visualized. (AU)

Affective Mobilizations: Pinkwashing and Racialized Homophobia in Out There.

This paper focuses on the affective economies which materialize around race, sexuality and queerness in the British context to enable the production and mobilization of an exceptionalist discourse of gay-friendly and post-homophobic Britain (i.e., pinkwashing). The author investigates the discursive workings of pinkwashing coupled with the racialization of homophobia, through a critical reading of the BBC Two documentary Out There (2013a), written and narrated by British gay-identified writer, activist and artist, Stephen Fry. The documentary captures and is in fact captured within a global moment of human rights speculation in which some European nation-states have invested in affective discourses of queer futurities as a marker of their capacity for tolerance, in contrast to predominantly racialized subjects/communities within and outside of Europe, increasingly naturalized as always already homophobic (i.e., racializing homophobia). My reading of the documentary demonstrates the interconnection between pinkwashing and racialized homophobia as discursive inventions which depend on the mobilization of affects such as love, pride, terror, hate and (un)happiness, as currencies of governance. Far from being universal or abstract, I contend that British LGBTQ human rights speculative discourse draws on a highly racialized affective economy-which constructs racialized communities within Britain and racialized populations and states outside the West, as excessively homophobic, rendering pre-dominantly gay male British subjects (and homopatriarchy) as exceptional patriots.

Transnational queer sociological analysis of sexual identity and civic-political activism in Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China.

The sociology of homosexuality lacks engagement with queer theory and postcolonialism and focuses primarily on the global metropoles, thus failing to provide a plausible account of non-Western non-normative sexual identities. This research adopts the author's newly proposed transnational queer sociology to address these deficiencies. First, it critiques the Western model of sexual identity predominantly employed to elucidate non-Western, non-normative sexualities. It does so by examining not only the queer flows between West and non-West but also those among and within non-Western contexts to produce translocally shared and mutually referenced experiences. Second, the proposed approach combines sociology with queer theory by emphasizing the significant role of material, as well as discursive, analyses in shaping queer identities, desires and practices. This article employs the approach to examine young gay male identities, as revealed in 90 in-depth interviews conducted in Hong Kong (n = 30), Taiwan (Taipei, n = 30) and mainland China (Shanghai, n = 30) between 2017 and 2019. More specifically, it highlights the interplay between the state and identity by investigating the intersection and intertwining effects of these young men's sexual and cultural/national identities, revealing three different forms of civic-political activism. The article both demonstrates the way in which sexuality and the state are mutually constituted and provides nuanced analysis of the heterogeneity of contemporary homosexualities in Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China. In applying a new sociological approach to understanding sexuality, this research joins the growing body of scholarship within sociology that is decentring the Western formation of universal knowledge.

Re-Reading Homonationalism: An Israeli Spatial Perspective.

In this article we stress the need for specifically located understandings of the concept of homonationalism, by introducing an analysis of spatial and political power relations dissecting disparate constructions of LGBT arenas. The article explores three spaces: Tel-Aviv-an urban space of LGBT belonging; Jerusalem-the Israeli capital where being an LGBT individual is problematic both in public and in private spaces; and Kiryat-Shmona-a conservative and peripheral underprivileged town in the north of Israel. By showing how local understandings of queer space shape power relations and translate into subjective spaces within wide-ranging power dynamics, we claim that homonationalism cannot be seen as one unitary, consolidated category or logic. Instead, we argue, homonationalism should be considered a multidirectional and multiscale political stance, manifesting cultural practices and political relationship with the state and society in distinct settings. By expanding considerations of the nuanced interplay of state power and LGBT spaces we aim to elucidate some paradoxes of homonationalism.

Rethinking Sexual Citizenship.

Over the last two decades sexuality has emerged as a key theme in debates about citizenship, leading to the development of the concept of sexual citizenship. This article reviews this literature and identifies four main areas of critical framing: work that contests the significance of sexuality to citizenship; critiques that focus on the possibilities and limitations of mobilising the language of citizenship in sexual politics; analyses of sexual citizenship in relation to nationalisms and border making; and literature that critically examines western constructions of sexuality and sexual politics underpinning understandings of sexual citizenship. In order to progress the field theoretically, the article seeks to extend critiques of sexual citizenship focusing on two key aspects of its construction: the sexual citizen-subject and spaces of sexual citizenship. It argues for a critical rethink that encompasses a de-centring of a 'western-centric' focus in order to advance understandings of how sexual citizenship operates both in the Global North and South.

Homonationalism Before Homonationalism: Representations of Russia, Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union in the U.S. Homophile Press, 1953-1964.

This essay focuses on representations of Russia, the Soviet Union, and Eastern Europe in U.S. homophile periodicals from 1953 to 1964. Extending the application of Jasbir Puar's concept of homonationalism to the Cold War period, the essay examines 128 articles and other items that were published in ONE, Mattachine Review, and The Ladder and demonstrates that these periodicals often engaged in homonationalist discourses when constructing the Russian, Soviet, and Eastern European "other." Negative constructions of these regions were sometimes used to affirm the political alignment of the homophile authors with the American nation. At other times, negative constructions were used in comparative assessments that critiqued both the United States and the Soviet and Eastern European regions. In contrast, positive constructions of Russian, Soviet, and Eastern European peoples and cultures were used as evidence that non-heteronormative desires and bodies had legitimate places in many "primitive" cultures and existed across all nations and periods.

"Homosexuality/Homophobia Is Un-African"?: Un-Mapping Transnational Discourses in the Context of Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Bill/Act.

This article un-maps the recent impasse between pro- and antigay mobilization around Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Act (AHA, 2009-2014). Drawing on scholarly and social media sources, it summarizes the increasing influence of (U.S.) transnational evangelism that has precipitated a state-religious complex of "anticipatory political homophobia" in Uganda. If transnational evangelism against same-sex sexuality in Uganda has generated a strong reaction from global LGBT human-rights advocates, this article critiques this Western homotransnationalist response by analyzing its limited terms of operation, focusing on the ways in which Uganda is hailed into the biopolitical project of a Western queer modernity. The author focuses on the copresence between homotransnationalist mobilization and "homophobic anticipatory countermobilization" as (re)organizing/suturing a global ordering project that is deeply invested in biopolitics and necropolitics. This suggests that the global flashpointing of Uganda in the context of the AHA incites further questions concerning the transnationality of "gay human rights" discourse under neoliberalism.

Homonacionalismo en Cataluña: una visión desde el activismo LGTBI / Homonationalism in Catalonia: an approach from LGTBI activism

El homonacionalismo constituye un marco conceptual que permite comprender cómo las políticas LGTB han sido instrumentalizadas en la construcción de una diferenciación geopolítica de carácter colonial. Construye relaciones de equivalencia entre las posiciones de sujeto 'homosexual' y 'nacional' que permite una diferenciación intra-nacional y entre-naciones de sujetos y poblaciones, justificando políticas de afirmación con base en el avance en algunos de los derechos humanos. Este fenómeno ha sido identificado principalmente en las políticas LGTB de EE. UU. y su desarrollo teórico se está extendiendo por el mundo. Ante los recientes desarrollos, tanto en términos de identidad nacional como de prácticas y marcos legales en defensa de los derechos LGTB, Cataluña podría constituir un territorio propicio para la construcción de un excepcionalismo que alimente discursos homonacionalistas. En este trabajo, se explora este tipo de discurso en narrativas construidas con activistas de grupos LGTBI en Barcelona, constatando su presencia y la consolidación de una normatividad que es cuestionada por las activistas.

Homonationalism is a conceptual framework that allows to understand how the struggle for LGTB rights is being assimilated by national exceptionalism in order to constitute a geopolitical colonial differentiation. It builds equivalences between homosexual and national subject positions that allows the differentiation of subject positions and populations within the country and between countries, justifying policies based on the differentiation of human rights development. This phenomenon has been applied to the US and its theoretical development is being spreading throughout the world. In light of recent developments both in terms of national identity and LGTB legal rights, Catalonia could be susceptible of an exceptionalism that could lead to homonationalist discourses. This paper explores the homonationalist discourse in Catalonia using narratives from LGTBI activists. Participants identify a homonationalist discourse and recognise the presence of homo-normativity questioned by the activist. Nevertheless, a homonationalist geopolitical hierarchy is not appreciated.

'Solemnis(ing) beginnings': theories of same-sex marriage in the USA and South Africa.

This paper explores arguments for and against same-sex marriage as 'movement advocacy' in the USA as a backdrop to the proposition that, despite the influence of US discourses on South African debates about same-sex marriage, US discussions are less important to understanding South African responses than controversies about marriage itself in the country. The paper works in two sections. First it sketches legal and critical tensions within the USA around the implications of same-sex marriage activism, drawing on work from Franke, Brandzel, Grossman, Puar and others. Second, it notes arguments on queer homonationalisms, made most forcefully by Puar, concerning the effects and interests of 'exporting' US legal ideals to countries elsewhere, especially poorer countries. It then moves to offer suggestions for ways of nuancing this argument through stronger critical attention to context concerning radically shifting notions of marriage within those countries themselves, using South Africa as a case study. This section draws on recent work by Judge, van Zyl, Scott, Mkhize and Adebayo and Nyameza, among others.