Beyond A Lesbian Space? An Investigation on The Intergenerational Discourse Surrounding Lesbian Public Social Places in Amsterdam

Abstract

This article investigates intergenerational discourse on public lesbian social spaces within Amsterdam, Netherlands. The author seeks to address how lesbian women from different generations talk about lesbian social spaces in Amsterdam through anthropological ethnographic research and semistructured interviews with 20 lesbian women who have or currently are attending these places. The author also addresses the gradual decline of lesbian specific spaces in the city and the current belief that lesbian women are beyond having a public social space that services only the lesbian community. The rise in popularity of mixed gay- and lesbian-friendly bars and girl circuit parties will be identified as a key area where generational tensions and discourse are being played out. Issues pertaining to generational disagreements over lesbian identity, visibility, and space will be addressed.

Keywords:

• generation
• lesbian
• space
• tolerance

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank everyone who participated in this research project and extend a special thank you to all of the respondents, many of whom took me into their private homes, businesses and bars and took time out of their very busy lives to talk to me. This project would be nothing without their enthusiasm and cooperation. A special thank you goes to the organizers, researchers, and contributors to Stichting Ondersteboven who were extremely helpful and welcoming to my project. I would also like to thank UvA gay pride, a LGBT student organization at the University of Amsterdam. The organizers and volunteers were also very supportive of this project. Finally, a special thank you must go out to the International Homo and Lesbian Information center and archive (IHLIA).

I also would like to thank my two supervisors, Professor Gert Hekma and Dr. Sébastien Chauvin, for taking time for me and being a great voice of critique and understanding through my fieldwork. I also thank Dr. Gloria Wekker for her advice and input on this project. I want to thank Mirjam Hemker for her support and to the rest of the writers and editors of the Lesbo Encyclopedie for their research. Last, but not least, I want to thank my two editors, Edward Chinevere and Brandon Cirillo, for their great work and support.

Notes

1. Within this research, ethnicity was rarely brought up when talking about diversity in the lesbian scene. It was only when I specifically asked the respondents about ethnic diversity in the current lesbian bar and party culture that many were prompted to talk about their perceptions of the diversity in the lesbian social scene. Many described the lesbian social scene as still being predominately White and native-born Dutch. For party organizers, like Bianca G, the little ethnic diversity there was within the lesbian scene was seen as an obstacle that she continues to try to overcome in her parties, but comes with much frustration. When stating that the lesbian social scene was not very diverse in regards to ethnicity, the question that repeatedly came up from the respondents was: Where do Black lesbian women go, if not to the lesbian bars and parties? There was a feeling of separation and distance between lesbian women from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds. One reason for this could be that the lesbian social scene is limited in regards to expression of identity and sexual relationships. To enter a lesbian space one may feel pressure to speak the common language, behave in a certain way and adopt the labeling “lesbian” with all of its social and political significance. Lesbian space has the potential, therefore, to limit the spectrum of identity (even removing the ability to have multiple identities), expression, and relationships between people. However, for others, ethnic diversity within the lesbian social scene was not seen as a major problem as the lesbian bars and parties were in comparison much more diverse than the normal hetero bars. Not noticing or being unaware of ethnic diversity within the lesbian social scene was another comment that was continuously brought up when asked about ethnicity. For some of the women, being unaware or not noticing the ethnic makeup of the patrons could be stemming from the fact that the majority of the women that were interviewed for this project were Caucasian. But, for some of the women, the fact that there may be fewer Blacks or non-Whites in a bar or a party did not mean that the space was not diverse. For these women, diversity went beyond skin color or population count, but spoke to the feeling of being accepted within the space you are in. This leads to the question, then, of how diversity and ethnicity is really framed within the gay and lesbian population of the Netherlands. Unfortunately, for the scope of this research project this question is still left to be answered. While my goal for this research was to be as variable as possible in regard to age, class, and ethnicity, it was much framed in a certain subpopulation and context of what it means to be a lesbian and what are lesbian spaces. There is still so much to be known about lesbian women or women who are attracted sexually or emotionally to other women from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds within the Netherlands.

2. It is important to note that although all of the popular lesbian bars and parties within the city have adopted a mix labelling, the term mix can have very different meanings. The three popular lesbian bars, Sappho, Viva La Vie, and Saarein II, have attached the term mix or gay friendly to their advertisements in order to state that gay men and lesbian-tolerant heterosexual men and women are allowed to enter. But, despite this usage, the majority of women I talked to still considered Sappho, Viva la Vie, and Saarein II as primarily lesbian spaces due to the clientele consisting mostly of lesbian women. In regard to the longstanding queer bar De Trut, the term mix implied all non-heterosexual persons, and even though some heterosexual men and women have been allowed into the club, they have not been allowed to display heterosexual actions, such as men and women kissing one another. Large-scale commercial girl parties like Flirtation were referred to as mix because their clientele consisted of heterosexual, bi-curious, bisexual and lesbian women. And some parties, such as Tompoes, actively sought to have a physically mixed environment where there were an equal number of gays and lesbians in the crowd.