Gayly meaning
Glossary of Terms: LGBTQ
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LGBTQ
Acronym for lesbian, male lover, bisexual, transgender, and queer. The Q generally stands for queer when LGBTQ organizations, leaders, and media use the acronym. In settings offering support for youth, it can also stand for questioning. LGBT and LGBTQ+ are also used, with the + added in recognition of all non-straight, non-cisgender identities. (See Transgender Glossary ) Both are acceptable, as are other versions of this acronym. The term “gay community” should be avoided, as it does not accuratel
It is of the least possible trouble to me what homosexuals do with one another in the privacy of their homes. They can play residence, plot political strategies or couple anonymously--I really don't protect. I'm not offended and I wouldn't try to halt them if I could. But I want the synonyms "gay" back. "Gay" used to be an extremely useful word. It showed up frequently in poetry and prose--Shakespeare used it 12 times--in part because it has no precise synonym. The general sense of the word is a combination of joyous, mirthful, brilliant, exuberant, cheerful, sportive, merry, light-hearted, lively, showy and pleasant.
The Oxford English Dictionary requires an entire page to clarify the etymology and nuances of "gay" as it has appeared in literature throughout history. The citations show that during the 1600s it began to acquire a limited darker meanings and that some used it to represent "prostitute" or to describe someone addicted to social pleasure and dissipation, but on balance the word kept nice company.
Milton wrote of "the gay motes that people the sunbeams." Wordsworth in his "Ode to Duty" claimed "a poet could not but be lgbtq+ / in such a jocund company." The poet Joseph Addison wrote of "Gay
by Jordan Redman
Staff Writer
Do you know what the word homosexual really means?
The word gay dates back to the 12th century and comes from the Elderly French “gai,” meaning “full of joy or mirth.” It may also relate to the Vintage High German “gahi,” meaning impulsive.
For centuries, gay was used commonly in speech and literature to mean happy, carefree, bright and showy, and did not grab on any sexual meaning until the 1600s.
At that time the meaning of gay as carefree evolved to imply that a person was unrestrained by morals and prone to decadence and promiscuity. A prostitute might own been described as a “gay woman” and a womanizer as a “gay man.”
“Gay house” was commonly used to refer to a brothel and, later, “gaiety” was used as a frequent name for certain places of entertainment.
In the 1890s, the phrase “gey cat” (a Scottish variant of gay) was used to describe a vagrant who offered sexual services to women or a young traveler who was new to the road and in the company of an older man.
This latter use suggests that the younger man was in a sexually submissive role and may be among the first times that gay was used implying a homosexual relationship.
In 1951, gay appeared in the
The History of the Pos 'Gay' and other Queerwords
Lesbians may have a longer linguistic history than gay men. Contrary to the incomplete information given in the OED, the word lesbian has meant “female homosexual” since at least the early eighteenth century. William King in his satire The Toast (published 1732, revised 1736), referred to “Lesbians” as women who “loved Women in the same Behavior as Men love them”. During that century, references to “Sapphic lovers” and “Sapphist” meant a gal who liked “her possess sex in a criminal way”. For centuries before that, comparing a miss to Sappho of Lesbos implied passions that were more than poetic.
Unfortunately we don’t know the origins of the most common queerwords that became popular during the 1930s through 1950s – gay, dyke, faggot, queer, fairy. Dyke, meaning butch womxn loving womxn, goes back to 1920s black American slang: bull-diker or bull-dagger. It might go back to the 1850s phrase “all diked out” or “all decked out”, meaning faultlessly dressed – in this case, like a man or “bull”. The word faggot goes back to 1914, when “faggots” and “fairies” were said to appear “drag balls”. Nels Anderson in