A general address term in Communist China, tongzhi ‘comrade’ was appropriated by gay rights activists in Hong Kong to refer to members of sexual minorities. Examining its level of acceptance among non-activist gay and lesbian Hongkongers, this article argues that non-activists’ ideology about sexuality accounts for their rejection of tongzhi and their preference for strategies that leave same-sex desire unspecified. This study demonstrates how the discursive history of a label can both enable and impede its political efficacy. It also sheds light on the internal resistance that representatives of minority groups encounter when introducing new labels for those they supposedly speak for.
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Cited by (6)
Cited by six other publications
Pak, Vincent
2021. Coming out ‘softly’. Gender and Language 15:3
Lau, Holning, Geoffrey Yeung, Rebecca L. Stotzer, Charles Q. Lau & Kelley Loper
2017. Assessing the Tongzhi Label: Self-Identification and Public Opinion. Journal of Homosexuality 64:4 ► pp. 509 ff.
Levon, Erez
2015. Integrating Intersectionality in Language, Gender, and Sexuality Research. Language and Linguistics Compass 9:7 ► pp. 295 ff.
2015. Politics of labeling. In The International Encyclopedia of Human Sexuality, ► pp. 861 ff.
Wong, Andrew D.
2015. Tongzhi. In The International Encyclopedia of Human Sexuality, ► pp. 1355 ff.
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 21 september 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
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