Homosexuality Katz Summary

Binary thinking of sexuality is relatively recent, as it emerged in the late 19th century as a medical framework for understanding sexuality. Some historians believe that heterosexuality was invented in response to the more visible homosexual culture that was able to thrive during the depression era (pg. 337). In response to the homosexual culture that was developing, heterosexual norms started to be articulated in popular culture like magazines, movies, and songs (pg. 347), but it was not uniform, as men and women perceived those norms differently (pg. 347). The main point of Katz’s essay is that heterosexuality should not be seen as something that is timeless and natural, but as something that developed in response to modern sexuality (pg. 348). Heterosexuality being timeless would be ahistorical (pg. 348), because

349). This lack of study is mostly because studying the subject would cause it to lose power. As there has been no study disproving, or proving, the concept of heterosexuality, it maintains its privilege as being the normal and natural thing in society (pg. 349). Katz begins his analysis of heterosexuality with the United States from 1820 to 1860, where heterosexuality did not exist, instead the Americans believed in “a True Womanhood, True Manhood, and True Love, all characterized by “purity” – the freedom from sensuality” (pg. 350). During the Victorian era, True Love was realized with procreation and marriage (pg. 350). The focus on marriage and procreation meant that men and women were not necessarily seen or defined as heterosexual. As such, sex was not imbued with lust or eroticism, as it was for the sole purpose of procreation. However, when homosexuality began to develop in Victorian America and in Germany from 1860-1892, the modern ideas around eroticism and heterosexuality were in development (pg.