indeed, it is a choice youth make to claim language, all of its "worst"
expressions especially, and taunt the gate-keepers of "civilized speech" ,
if only to catch them off-guard... meaning youth know how hypocritical
language rules are, and "rules" for what kinds of speech are appropriate
often signal repressed meanings -
certainly playing with "dangerous" words is one way to tease out
the repressed meanings: this why I choose to play with words, because what
I might mean takes so many twists and turns depending upon the metaphor, or
noun, or modifier (especially modifiers, don't we *love* modifying words?
hee hee) -
but in contexts of sexuality, it is interesting to see how issues of choice
are played out... when choice is so constrained that even choosing is,
effectively, not-choosing but accepting what Raymond Williams calls "..the
inevitable..." effects of dominant traditions and cultures...
maybe it is precisely because of the constraints, that the choice to play
with sexuality has been so recently accepted as a counter-hegemonic
practice of the avant-garde
(whoever they are/[not]) - in say, Annie Sprinkle's performance art which
are notoriously "offensive", to the extent that she pees on stage, etc.) -
although whether this is offensive or an act of revolt (which is offesnive,
too, actually) -rather, whether it can be conceptualized as a question of
"tact" or "good taste" or
whether it can be complicated by the political intent, I think, may rest in
our own willingness to regard playfulness as an important strategy,
while at the same timebeing wary of who plays with what, how, for whom, and
so on.
I think Jay's writing makes clear that it is difficult to know whether or
not choice can exist as a viable option for folks, or whether it is
invariably manipulated by social constraints, or maybe there are blurred
spaces where both are possibly the same;
identity choices, especially, change, mutate, spill over, evaporate (my
"capitalist-bitch" identity is all but a stain on my conscience); but I am
always wondering about the identity choices which can never be made, or are
refused, policed, and how many "possible" people are out there, as we
speak, in varying stages of compromise...
diane
"Every tool is a weapon if you hold it right." Ani Difranco
*********************************************
diane celia hodges
faculty of education, centre for the study of curriculum and
instruction,
university of british columbia
vancouver, bc canada
snailmail: 3519 Hull Street
Vancouver, BC, Canada V5N 4R8