“The Night They Took Over”: Misogyny in a Country-Western Gay Bar

Abstract

Informed by feminism and theories of masculinity and space, this ethnography explores how gay men negotiate hegemonic masculinity in response to Lesbian Night, a regular Thursday night occurrence when women outnumber men at a country-western gay bar. Findings are examined to reveal the misogynistic assumptions inherent in gay men's reaction to Lesbian Night. Gay men's attempt to define the bar as a gay male space highlights their allegiance to a normative dialectic that pits men against women, and shows their unwillingness to forgo the authority and power inherent in their position as men. These findings highlight the complexities that lie at the intersection of gender and sexuality, and illustrate leisure spaces as complex and dynamic locations that foster inequity as well as community.

Keywords:

• lesbian
• gay
• masculinity
• leisure
• ethnography