Lesbian and Gay Identity Politics

In Hungary’s current transition, several gay and lesbian grass roots movements and  civil organizations have become visible – these social practices make lesbian and gay theories relevant in Hungary. The present thematic section in Replika provides an introduction to gay and lesbian theories focusing on American, Northern European and Hungarian examples. The essays collected here study the construction, reproduction, and subversion of lesbian and gay identities and identitity politics within different terrains, and demonstrate the complexity and contradictions of the question which evade easy generalizations.
In the introduction, Csilla Kalocsai attempts to define the broad and shifting field of lesbian and gay theory. She traces how gay and lesbian studies have emerged in Western Europe, and follows the different paths of theory and activism in Western Europe and America. In the first article, Judit Takács addresses the medical, psychiatric and social scientific productions of the category of homosexuality, and illustrates her points with a few Hungarian examples. 
The two following essays describe the shifts in American lesbian and gay identitity politics. Diana Fuss defines identity politics as a historical and cultural construct, and although she claims that identity politics have an encouraging effect on lesbian and gay community formation, she also challenges the presumptions that constitute the concepts of identity and politics. The second American author, Lisa Duggan analyzes the new potentials of American queer theories and politics. Providing space for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered and sometimes heterosexual people, queer thinking transgresses gendered and sexual borders, and creates flexible identities and provisional coalitions. 
In the last essay, Henning Bech explores the disappearance of the social and cultural conditions that have historically constituted the framework for modern homosexuality, and offers a Northern European example for the disappearance of the “modern homosexual” as a result of these changes. Bech introduces the term homo-genisation to describe the new social and cultural context of postmodern society.