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Gay, Gay

The word "gay" arrived in English during the 12th century from Old French gai , most likely deriving ultimately from a Germanic source.

For example, the optimistic 1890s are still often referred to as the Gay Nineties . The title of the 1938 French ballet Gat Parisienne ("Parisian Gaiety") also illustrates this connotation. It was apparently not until the 20th century that the word began to be used to mean specifically "homosexual", although it had earlier acquired sexual connotations.

Such usage is documented as early as the 1920s, and there is evidence for it before the 20th century, although it was initially more commonly used to imply heterosexually unconstrained lifestyles, as in the once-common phrase "gay Lothario", or in the title of the book and film The Gay Falcon (1941), which concerns a womanizing detective whose first name is "Gay." Well into the mid 20th century a middle-aged bachelor could be described as "gay", indicating that he was unattached and therefore free, without any implication of homosexuality. This usage could apply to women too. The British comic strip Jane was first published in the 1930s and described the adventures of Jane Gay . Far from implying homosexuality, it referred to her free-wheeling lifestyle with plenty of boyfriends (while also punning on Lady Jane Grey).

According to Linda Wagner-Martin ( Favored Strangers: Gertrude Stein and her Family (1995)) the portrait, "featured the sly repetition of the word gay, used with sexual intent for one of the first times in linguistic history," and Edmund Wilson (1951, quoted by James Mellow in Charmed Circle (1974)) agreed Martha E. Stone, Sept-Oct, 2002.

In a scene where Cary Grant's clothes have been sent to the cleaners, he must wear a lady's feathery robe. When another character inquires about his clothes, he responds "Because I just went gay...all of a sudden!" However, since this was a mainstream film at a time when the use of the word to refer to homosexuality would still be unfamiliar to most film-goers, the line can also be interpreted to mean "I just decided to do something frivolous." There is much debate about what Grant meant with the ad-lib (the line was not in the script).The word continued to be used with the dominant meaning of "carefree", as evidenced by the title of The Gay Divorcee (1934), a musical film about a heterosexual couple. It was originally to be called "The Gay Divorce" after the play on which it was based, but the Hays Office determined that while a divorcee may be gay, it would be unseemly to allow a divorce to appear so.

Other connotations of frivolousness and showiness in dress ("gay attire") led to association with camp and effeminacy. This association no doubt helped the gradual narrowing in scope of the term towards its current dominant meaning, which was at first confined to subcultures.

It has nevertheless been claimed that "gay" stands for "Good As You", but there is no evidence for this: it is a folk etymology backronym.

Conversely, some people find the term gay to be offensive or reject it as an identity-label because they perceive the cultural connotations to be undesirable or because of the negative connotations of the slang usage of the word.

For example, while a gay bar is not itself homosexual, using the term " gay " as an adjective to describe the bar indicates that the bar is either homosexually-oriented, caters primarily to a homosexual clientle, or is otherwise part of homosexual culture.

By contrast, using " gay " in the pejorative sense, to describe something solely as negative, can cause offense.

The term has been in use as a noun with the meaning "homosexual man" since the 1970s, as in "gays are opposed to that policy." Although some dislike this usage, it is common particularly in the names of various organizations such as Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) and Children Of Lesbians And Gays Everywhere (COLAGE). It is sometimes used as a singular noun, as in "he is a gay", such as in its use to comic effect by the Little Britain character Dafydd Thomas.

Source: Wikipedia > Gay