Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers : A History of Lesbian Life in Twentieth-Century America

by Faderman, Lillian (Author)

• ISBN13: 9780140171228
• ISBN10: 0140171223
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1992-06-01
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
• More Book Details
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Summary

Lesbian life in America continues to evolve. As Lillian Faderman writes, there are "no constants with regard to lesbianism," except that lesbians prefer women. In this book, Faderman reclaims the story of lesbian life in twentieth-century America, tracing the evolution of lesbian identity and subcultures from early networks to today's diverse lifestyles. Faderman samples from journals, unpublished manuscripts, songs, media accounts, novels, medical literature, pop culture artifacts, and rich firsthand testimony with lesbians of all races, ages, and classes, uncovering a surprising narrative of unparalleled depth and originality.

Table of Contents

Introduction	1	(10)
1. "The Loves of Women for Each Other": "Romantic Friends" in the Twentieth Century	11	(26)
The Educated "Spinster"	13	(5)
The Metamorphosis of Romantic Friendship	18	(4)
"Poets and Lovers Ever-more,"	22	(9)
Lesbian Sex Between "Devoted Companions,"	31	(6)
2. A Worm in the Bud: The Early Sexologists and Love Between Women	37	(25)
Sexual Inversion and "Masculine" or Transvestite Women	41	(4)
Feminists as Sexual Freaks	45	(3)
The Attack on "Romantic Friendship,"	48	(6)
The Dissemination of Knowledge Through Fiction	54	(3)
Why Some Lesbians Accepted the Congenital Invert Theory	57	(5)
3. Lesbian Chic: Experimentation and Repression in the 1920s	62	(31)
The Roots of Bisexual Experimentation	63	(4)
White "Slumming" in Harlem	67	(5)
Black Lesbians in Harlem	72	(7)
A Note on Working-Class Lesbian Communities Elsewhere in America	79	(2)
Lesbians in Bohemia	81	(7)
The Heterosexual Revolution and the Lesbian in the Woodpile	88	(5)
4. Wastelands and Oases: The 1930s	93	(25)
Kinder, Kuche, Kirche and the "Bisexual" Compromise	94	(5)
The View from the Outside	99	(6)
"In the Life,"	105	(7)
Lesbian Sex in the 1930s	112	(6)
5. "Naked Amazons and Queer Damozels": World War II and Its Aftermath	118	(21)
Armies of Lovers	120	(15)
A "Government-Sponsored" Subculture	135
The Heyday of the Lesbian "Sicko,"	130
Curing Lesbians on the Couch	134	(5)
6. The Love that Dares Not Speak Its Name: McCarthyism and Its Legacy	139	(20)
"Are You or Have You Even Been a Member of a Lesbian Relationship?,"	143	(7)
War in the Cold War Years: The Military Witch-Hunts	150	(5)
A Sad Legacy	155	(4)
7. Butches, Femmes, and Kikis: Creating Lesbian Subcultures in the 1950s and '60s	159	(29)
Working-Class and Young Lesbians: The Gay Bars	161	(6)
Working-Class and Young Lesbians: Butch/Femme Roles	167	(8)
"Kiki" Lesbians: The Upper and Middle Classes and Subculture Clashes	175	(13)
8. "Not a Public Relations Movement": Lesbian Revolutions in the 1960s Through '70s	188	(27)
The Gay Revolution: Quiet Beginnings	190	(4)
The Gay Revolution: Explosion	194	(7)
Love Between Women in a New Light	201	(3)
The Lesbian-Feminist Revolution	204	(5)
Splits, Coalitions, and Resolutions	209	(6)
9. Lesbian Nation: Creating a Women-Identified-Women Community in the 1970s	215	(31)
Blueprints for a Lesbian-Feminist Culture	218	(2)
Culture Building: The Media	220	(6)
Taking Care of Our Own: Body and Soul	226	(4)
Being "Politically Correct,"	230	(5)
Factions and Battles	235	(11)
10. Lesbian Sex Wars in the 1980s	246	(25)
Lesbian Sex and the Cultural Feminists	249	(3)
The Struggle to Be Sexually Adventurous	252	(8)
The Attraction of "Opposites,"	260	(11)
11. From Tower of Babel to Community: Lesbian Life in the 1980s	271	(32)
The Shift to Moderation	274	(10)
Validation of Diversity	284	(8)
Unity	292	(7)
A Note on the '90s: Queer Nation?,	299	(4)
Epilogue: Social Constructions and the Metamorphoses of Love Between Women	303	(6)
Notes	309	(54)
Index	363