Article published in:
Language & Citizenship
Edited by Tommaso M. Milani
[Journal of Language and Politics 14:3] 2015
► pp. 431–454

Sexual cityzenship

Discourses, spaces and bodies at Joburg Pride 2012

| University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
This article explores an incident that took place in the context of Joburg Pride 2012, where the activist group One in Nine Campaign attempted to temporarily stop the Pride parade through means of a die-in protest, resulting in resistance and violence on the part of the Pride participants. The article argues that Pride and the One in Nine protest are manifestations of two very different types of sexual cityzenship. Whilst Pride is an orderly claim to the urban environment that is founded on an alignment with state-sanctioned, rights-based discourses of gay and lesbian identity, the One in Nine protest is a spatial disruption that problematises the optimistic reliance on sexual identities as catalysts for political action. The article also seeks to offer a queer epistemology that questions the logocentric bias of research on discourse, space and citizenship by encompassing not only the visual but also and most importantly the corporeal.
Keywords: affect, citizenship, linguistic landscapes, national identity, queer, sexuality, South Africa, space
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Discourse-Based Studies on Citizenship Meet Research on Linguistic Landscapes… Through Sexuality
  • 3.Joburg Pride vs. One in Nine Campaign
    • 3.1Joburg Pride 2012
    • 3.2One in Nine Campaign
  • 4.Troubling Performances of Sexual Cityzenship
    • 4.1Pride/shame and national identity: Proudly South African or not?
    • 4.2History repeats… uncannily: Black bodies on the tarmac
  • 5.Concluding Remarks
  • References
Published online: 21 August 2015
https://doi.org/10.1075/jlp.14.3.06mil
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