John Boswell Flashcards
Why is it important for History to have gay people?
- Gives a holistic history- Boswell speaks of the revolutions in the twentieth century of looking at minority history.
- Precedent when seen in history, seen as better/acceptable today.
- Historians supposed to be truth-tellers- cannot just ignore.
- Gives an indication of the broader methodological problems of studying history.
Why is it important for gay people to have history?
- not unusual/strange to be gay- ‘we read to know we aren’t alone’.
- Legitimizes homosexuality- gives it a past- Steven Saylor wrote of Boswell’s book that it was important because ‘we have no roots’ - needs roots to construct identity.
- Can give an understanding to people that have none- can eradicate persecution!
What are the methodological problems studying the history of homosexuality?
- people may try and suppress it- from Martin Duberman, Dr Archer tried to suppress the romantic correspondence between Hammond and Withers - thinking that it may be embarrassing to the family.
- Censorship- could be written in codes- euphemisms.
- Can change name/sex to hide identity.
- Fewer sources to pick from
- sources come from enemy?
- Interpretation and bias of the historian.
- anachronism- always a struggle in history anyways.
Was homosexuality acceptable in ancient Greece?
- Crompton argues that it was often pictured in regards to art and literature.
- Pederasty- relationship between an older man and a boy- was often seen as a right of passage.
- The sacred band of thebes- army in 4th century- made up exclusively gay couples- idea that lovers would protect eachother- homosexuality was important in establishing an army of military strength!
Was homosexuality acceptable in Rome?
- Seemed to take a lot of influence from ancient Greece.
- slave bodies- at their masters disposal- figure of Ganymeade
- There were some instances when people thought that homosexuality was responsible for the fall of Rome- Robert de Mattei- conquering Carthage- thought of as a paradise of homosexuality.
Why was ‘sexuality’ as a concept different from modern day understanding?
- Was not the category that it is now- was not the understanding of homosexuality and heterosexuality-Halperin- no modern word for someone who eats chicken, because it is a category that just doesn’t exist.
- David Halperin argues that attitudes towards sex did not regard it is a an act involving different people- but rather as an act of one person to another.
- John Winkler- not that others are not present, but that the act does not depend on cooperation or benefit of the second party.
- Halperin ‘Sex was a manifestation of public status, and a declaration of social identity’.
- Sex was a manifestation of power more than anything else.
When did homosexuality become unacceptable?
- Men had to take the active role- the spreading of their seed- Boswell identifies two roles that were acceptable- to offer penis to be sucked, and to penetrate a female or a male.
- Taking the passive role- seen as feminine- Halperin looks at an example by Caelius, a 5th c. African writer- in discussing the treatment of a disease which causes increased libido- do not admit young women AND boys, as seen as too attractive to the patient.
- Relation between sexual partners was that of servant and master- the man should look at his inferiors in which to penetrate.
- Boswell states that ‘it is not clear that Romans had no interest in the gender of sexual partners, only that the divisions of Labour, as it were, was a more pressing concern and attracted more analytical attention.
Who is John Boswell?
(1947- 1994) A historian at Yale - d. of aids related complications in 1994- the year of publication of his fourth book Same Sex Unions. Most famous for his book Christianity, Social Tolerance and Homosexuality.
Converted from Episcopal church to Romance Catholicism at the age of 16- despite having many problems with the church, remained loyal etc.
What was the Boswell thesis?
Identified by Matthew Kuefler in his book- states that Boswell has four main points:
1. Christianity had come into existence in an atmosphere of roman and Greek tolerance for same-sex eroticism
2. Nothing in the Christian scriptures of early tradition required a hostile assessment of homosexuality- assessments caused this.
3. Early medieval Christians showed no real animosity towards homosexuals
4. It was in the twelfth and 13th centuries that hostility for homosexuality was read back into scriptures.
other points were that homosexuality was a legitimate field of historical study, terms like nature and natural have changed throughout time, and that tolerance of homo-eroticism shared a relationship with urbanism!
How was Boswell received?
Immediate and dramatic response- 10 August 1980, Paul Robinson in a review calls his book revolutionary!
Before Boswell had only been a few books circulated- John Addington Symons A problem of Greek Ethics(1873)- Derrick Sherwin Baileys Homosexuality (1955), John McNeils The Church and the homosexual (1976).
Carolyn Dinshaw states that the amount of success for CSTH was overwhelming and publisher could not keep up- hardcover copy went into 5 printings in less than a year.
in the 1990s- CSTH still selling around 200 copies a year in the US.
Ranked top of the 100 best and most influential non-fiction books about gay men and lesbians in 2004.
NY times Best book in 1980
Cult of personality engulfed Boswell- gave a lecture in 1983 to an audience in the West Hollywood Presbyterian Church- Newspaper reported that he was received like a teenage heart-throb.
What praise has Boswell received?
-Paul Robinson, ‘John Boswell restore’s one’s faith in scholarship in the union of erudition, analysis and moral vision’.
-praised for using quite a lot of detail and primary material: Robert Towler(1981) University of Leeds: ‘ since it is a work of painstaking and fastidious scholarship, which is also immensely readable’- This is good because of the audience that Boswell was trying to reach (according to his friend Ralph Hexter).
-Towler- ‘the book is without rivals’.
‘fundamental for the future studies of homosexuals in the west’ John C. Moore (1981).
-Steven Saylor- John Boswell taken a long step towards rectifying the lack of roots that in history that gay men have.
What are the common criticisms of Boswell?
- That he is exonerating the Christian church of blame- which caused much anger- Wayne Dynes, editor of Gay Books Bulletin- ‘Christianity is definitely guilty of the stigmatization and persecution of same-sex relations in our civilization…and until those who call themselves Christians are ready humbly to acknowledge this, they are coming to us with dirty hands’.
- That he is anachronistic in his use of the word ‘gay’- ‘homosexuality refers to general phenomenon of same sex relations, gay in contrast refers to people who are conscious of erotic inclinations of their own gender as a distinguishing characteristic’- accusations of essentialism
- Ignored lesbians- Jane Vanderbosch- Boswell failed to consider sources that might have shed light on the lesbian experience.
What debates arose from Boswell’s anachronism?
Essential ism V. Social Construction ism
Essentialism- realist- that categories exist because humans recognize real distinctions in the world- discovery- scientific.
Social Constructionist- Nominalists- categories of sexual preference and behaviour are created by humans and human societies.
Essentialism is largely seen as out of favour- especially in regards to this question because sexuality was so different then
How did Boswell respond to these criticisms
In Revolutions, Universal and Sexual Categories 1982- argues that if homosexuality is just a category- then gay history does not exist- tries to disengage it from debate.
However in 1987- backtracks slightly- says is no debate because no one agrees with essential ism- gets rid of his definition of gay as being someone who is conscious of this as a distinguishing identity.
Who criticises Boswell’s essentialist approach
Padgug argues against Boswell ‘in any approach that takes as predetermined and universal the categories of sexuality, real history disappears’- argues that sexuality is a modern concept’ homosexual and heterosexual behavior may be universal: homosexual and heterosexual identity and consciousness are modern realities’- doesn’t develop until at least 17th c.
‘nothing is more essentially transmitted by a social process of leaning than sexual behaviour’ Mary Douglas.
