Defiant Desire records the lives of lesbian and gay South Africans of all races as they have lived in the face of censure, denial and oppression. The history of gay identity in South Africa is here in its past and present aspects: from a drag salon in Woodstock to a gay "shebeen" in kwaThema; from a church in a Pretoria nightclub to Johannesburg's lesbian and gay pride march; from Afrikaans love poetry to new activism. The book is a document of lesbian and gay struggle, and indispensable for those interested in the sexual politics coursing beneath the country's troubled passage to democracy.

Reviews

"With moving first-person accounts and fine attention to historical detail, these essays show us a South Africa the world could never have known." -- San FranciscoExaminer
"...Defiant Desire needs to be read." -- VLS
"Defiant Desire...is scrupoulous in representing the great range of voices that lay claim to gay and lesbian identity in South Africa, without pretending to be exhaustive or forgetting the enormous gender, race, and class differences between and amoung self-identified gays and lesbians." -- VLS
"Vividly capturing the diversity of lesbian and gay culture, Defiant Desire blends provocative testimony and nuanced analysis to raise important questions about race, sexuality, and gender ambiguity in South Africa." -- Anne McClintock, Columbia University

Book Information
ISBN 9780415910613
Author Edwin Cameron
Format Paperback
Page Count 406
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 750g