Community Connections, August, 1991 Page 21
Book
Corner
by Lorena Russell
Faderman, Lillian. Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers: A History of Lesbian Life in
Twentieth Century America. Between Men-Between Women: Lesbian and Gay Studies.
New York: Columbia UP, 1991. $29.95, 373 pp.
This book by Lillian Faderman
represents the most recent addition to a
series on lesbian and gay studies edited by
Richard D. Mohr. Faderman maintains
that social attitudes toward intimate
relations between women have affected
the expression of that intimacy as well as
the identity of the participants themselves.
In the nineteenth century, for example,
"romantic friendships" between women
were socially accepted institutions. These
intimate, ostensibly non-erotic
relationships are more fully explored in
Faderman’s earlier work, Surpassing the
Love of Men. In Odd Girls, Faderman
states that such relationships are socially
accepted only briefly at the beginning of
our century, vestiges of a less sexually
conscious, pre-Freudian era.
It was in the 1920s that the experts,
the sexologists, offered the theory that
lesbians were in fact "sexual inverts,"
men trapped in women’s bodies. The
majority of women accepted this
explanation, identifying themselves with a
masculine gender. Thirty years before,
intimacy between women was a sign of
feminine expression, but in the twenties it
was seen as decidedly male. Today most
lesbians would reserve the description of
sexual inverts for transsexuals, again
identifying themselves as fully female.
Faderman traces such changes in an
interesting and perceptive analysis. Her
historical journey leads us through the
Harlem of the 1920s, World War II, and
McCarthyism, including a discussion of
the legacy of fear it inspired, to the more
recent Lesbian Nation utopian longings of
the 1970s. Faderman’s findings are
carefully researched. Alongside of
traditional documents and authorities she
relies on a number of interviews, a
technique which adds an interesting and
revealing personal perspective.
I found the book consistently
engaging. I was sometimes concerned
that her emphasis on lesbian identity as a
socially constructed phenomenon diluted
the meaning of the word. Her conclusion
that "The only constant truth about The
Lesbian in America has been that she
prefers' women" (308) is not particularly
revealing or profound. Nevertheless her
approach makes sense when one takes into
account the inconsistencies and diversity
of lesbian identity through the years.
Another problem I had with the text
was the uneasy feeling that the portrait of
our 1990s community painted in the final
chapter of the book is a bit too glowing.
Faderman places a discussion of political
dogma and faction fighting in her chapter
on lesbian feminists of the 1970s. After
reading the descriptions of the recent
National Lesbian Conference in the last
Court Rules Against Lesbian Lovers
Use Hotline to Protest
After seven years of struggle in and
out of court, Karen Thompson learned
April 24 that she is not to be the legal
guardian of Sharon Kowalski, her partner
of several years who was left with severe
brain damage after a car accident. In a
ruling which outraged advocates of both
gay and physically-challenged rights,
Judge Robert Campbell granted
guardianship to a friend of Kowalski’s
parents, a woman who had indicated a
plan to move Kowalski to a nursing home
which Campbell himself had ruled
inadequate for Kowalski’s needs.
Kowalski had deteriorated significantly
while in nursing homes into which her
parents put her in the years immediately
following the accident.
Campbell alleged that Thompson had
outed Kowalski against her wishes, even
though Kowalski indicates she is a lesbian
issue of Community Connections, I
question delegating such problems as "the
liberal’s basic ineptness in dealing with
other classes and races" (243) or "bitter
skepticism and rebellion against p.c.
dogma...." (231) to a place in our past.
But then this is the charm and curse
of history, with its patterns and
repetitions. I highly recommend Odd
Girls and Twilight Lovers: entertaining
and insightful. ▼
to anyone who asks. Kowalski had
indicated her desire to live with
Thompson, but Campbell denied
Kowalski’s ability to make this decision.
Thompson was the only person who
had petitioned the court for guardianship.
Medical and psychological experts
testified overwhelmingly in favor of
Thompson being chosen as guardian.
Thompson wanted to bring Kowalski
home; instead, Kowalski is to remain in a
nursing home.
Thompson has appealed. Meanwhile,
a hotline has been set up to urge
Minnesota governor Arne Carlson to
intervene and appoint Thompson guardian.
For $6.25, a port.on of which goes to the
Karen Thompson Legal Fund, people can
call 1-800-3256000, ID #9860, to pressure
the governor.-Windy City Times, 6/6/91;
Sojourner, June, 1991 ▼
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