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Foucault cited Karl Westphal's famous 1870 article Contrary Sexual Feeling as the "date of birth" of the categorization of sexual orientation. Prior to that time, he said, the terms described practices and not identity. Historian and philosopher Michel Foucault argued that homosexual and heterosexual identities did not emerge until the 19th century. The choice of terms regarding sexual orientation may imply a certain political outlook, and different terms have been preferred at different times and in different places. Men on the down-low (or DL) may engage in covert sexual activity with other men while pursuing sexual and romantic relationships with women. Īmong some sectors of gay sub-culture, same-sex sexual behavior is sometimes viewed as solely for physical pleasure instead of romantic. Other terms include same gender loving and same-sex-oriented. The most common terms are gay (both men and women) and lesbian (women only).
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People with a same-sex sexual orientation generally prefer the terms gay, lesbian, or bisexual. The New Oxford American Dictionary says that gay is the preferred term. Gay man or lesbian are the preferred nouns for referring to people, which stress cultural and social matters over sex. Some have argued that homosexual places emphasis on sexuality over humanity, and is to be avoided when describing a person. When referring to people, homosexual is considered derogatory and the terms gay and lesbian are preferred. Using homosexuality or homosexual to refer to behavior may be inaccurate but does not carry the same potentially offensive connotations that using homosexual to describe a person does. However, the terms homosexual and homosexuality are sometimes deemed appropriate in referring to behavior (although same-sex is the preferred adjective). For instance, the Safe Schools Coalition of Washington's Glossary for School Employees advises that gay is the "preferred synonym for homosexual", and goes on to suggest avoiding the term homosexual as it is "clinical, distancing, and archaic". Same-sex oriented people seldom apply such terms to themselves, and public officials and agencies often avoid them. The Associated Press and New York Times style guides restrict usage of the terms.
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In particular, the description of individuals as homosexual may be offensive, partially because of the negative clinical association of the word stemming from its use in describing same-sex attraction as a pathological state before homosexuality was removed from the American Psychiatric Association's list of mental disorders in 1973. Some style guides recommend that the terms homosexual and homosexuality be avoided altogether, lest their use cause confusion or arouse controversy. Even if they do not consider the term offensive, some people in same-sex relationships may object to being described as homosexual because they identify as bisexual+, or another orientation. Author and gay pioneer Quentin Crisp said that the term should be "homosexualist", adding that no one says "I am a sexual." Some gay people argue that the use of homosexual as a noun is offensive, arguing that they are people first and their homosexuality being merely an attribute of their humanity. The term homosexual can be used as an adjective to describe the sexual attractions and behaviors of people attracted to the same sex. 2.8 Other late 19th and early 20th century sexological terms.Some communities have cants, a rich jargon used among a subgroup almost like a secret language, such as Polari in the U.K., and others. Numerous slang terms exist for homosexuals or homosexuality. Academia continues to coin related terms, including androphilia and gynephilia which designate only the object of attraction, thus divorcing the terms from sexual orientation entirely. Gay people may also be identified under the umbrella terms LGBT. Some of these words are specific to women, some to men, and some can be used of either. In English, some terms in widespread use have been sodomite, Sapphic, Uranian, homophile, lesbian, gay, effeminate, queer, homoaffective, and same-sex attracted. Terms used to describe homosexuality have gone through many changes since the emergence of the first terms in the mid-19th century. Two men at the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear indicate their identity with the word gay in the context of same-sex orientation, and protest its usage in the sense of stupid or uncool.