Boystown: Sex and Community in Chicago

by Jay Orne

From neighborhoods as large as Chelsea or the Castro, to locales limited to a single club, like The Shamrock in Madison or Sidewinders in Albuquerque, gay areas are becoming normal. Straight people flood in. Gay people flee out. Scholars call this transformation assimilation, and some argue that we—gay and straight alike—are becoming “post-gay.” Jason Orne argues that rather than post-gay, America is becoming “post-queer,” losing the radical lessons of sex.

In Boystown , Orne takes readers on a detailed, lively journey through Chicago’s Boystown, which serves as a model for gayborhoods around the country. The neighborhood, he argues, has become an entertainment district—a gay Disneyland—where people get lost in the magic of the night and where straight white women can “go on safari.” In their original form, though, gayborhoods like this one don’t celebrate differences; they create them. By fostering a space outside the mainstream, gay spaces allow people to develop an alternative culture—a queer culture that celebrates sex.

Orne spent three years doing fieldwork in Boystown, searching for ways to ask new questions about the connective power of sex and about what it means to be not just gay, but queer . The result is the striking Boystown , illustrated throughout with street photography by Dylan Stuckey. In the dark backrooms of raunchy clubs where bachelorettes wouldn’t dare tread, people are hooking up and forging “naked intimacy.” Orne is your tour guide to the real Boystown, then, where sex functions as a vital center and an antidote to assimilation.

Genres: Nonfiction, LGBT, Sociology, Gay

288 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2017

Reviews

[Will · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book caught my eye at Chicago's annual Printers' Row Literary Festival. Boystown is the nickname of the gay stretch of Halsted Street here in Chicago and I'm familiar enough with it to be interested in a book about it. Unfortunately, it's a timid thing staking a claim to being bold and incisive. Orne mixes participant observation and interviews with gassy and tacked-on references to Bourdieu and other sociologist and cultural observers. He visits what he calls "sexy" spaces to document their gayness and their importance to the formation of gay community and identity but describes them in terms so primly proper you'd think all the lights were turned on when he got there. Even though he claims to be a part of this gay demimonde, his descriptions of his being there make him seem more like Miss Manners than a full participant. (Guys who hit on him at a gay bar make him feel "awkward"; he only went to a bathhouse to use its gym...)
His interviews are awkward and choked with leading questions; he assumes quite a bit about what he's supposedly investigating. He also repeatedly identifies the various coffee shops and spots he does his interviews for some reason while also injecting just a bit too much information about himself. Being the ethnographer, even when you're a participant observer, means keeping yourself a bit in the background. I often thought he was using this study as an excuse to visit the gay bars and locations he comments on.
One thread that runs through the book and rings very true is the idea that Boystown (and areas like it) have become gay Disneylands for straights and women "on safari," as he puts it. It's no longer an exclusively gay place (if it ever really was) but a commercialized area for people to consume and observe gayness being played out. I also liked his use of the term "heritage commodification," which describes the transformation of genuine behaviors, interactions, and objects of significance into items for consumption by "others," i.e., those "on safari."
Despite my low rating, I did enjoy the parts of the book where he describes the area between Belmont and Addison--since I know it, it was fun to walk along with Orne as he visits the various bars and clubs and talks with people. The "sociology" part just doesn't mesh well with his own observations. It does make a reader wonder, however, what the future has in store for gay communities like Boystown.

[Mason · Rating 4 out of 5]

Trigger warning: homophobia, racism, discussion of racial stereotypes, mention of suicide, discussion of sex acts

I really enjoyed this book and it really brought me into the complex world that is Boystown. It gave me a lot of insight into the way queer culture has changed and is changing. While the book does verge on the academic at times, overall there are enough narratives to engage the reader throughout the entire book.

I take umbrage with the fact that there is more discussion of straight women than queer women. Queer women often have difficulty finding community, especially when queer scenes are highly dominated by gay men and their culture. There are fewer than fifteen lesbian bars in all of the US. Yet the author of this book on queer culture devoted almost an entire chapter to the perils of straight women and a few pages to an interview with a queer woman who says she doesn’t feel involved with the community. The exclusion of queer women didn’t bother me when I thought it was a book focusing solely on the culture of queer men. But the chapter on straight women just seems strange. The book also discusses trans women at length, but for a book on queer men, I was surprised to see no mention of trans men.

Overall, though, a good book. Lots of interesting tidbits about Chicago and Boystown. It really served the full experience. I also appreciated the author’s takes on race and class and how those intersect with queer identity to form a different experience.

[Charlie Weissman · Rating 2 out of 5]

Lots of thoughts. Very interesting premise but VERY heavy on the sociology. Felt very inaccessible to most audiences considering it was heavy on the sociological terminology and concepts and often focused on his biased theory and straws away from evidence. As someone who’s gay identity manifests in a very different way than the author’s it seems like he generated a view of Boystown that was very specific and didn’t necessarily encompass the variety of gay individuals that he pretended he did. I felt that the book could have been improved with a few more revisions to edit for grammar and focusing on more relevant subject matter. I did find it an interesting insight into a side of Boystown and Chicago more generally that I was unfamiliar with and also touched on interconnected issues like sexual racism, gentrification, and other interesting topics. Wouldn’t recommend to most audiences unless you’re a ga Chicagoan who loves sociology lmao

[Stephen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting premise for an ethnography but would benefited from a better editor to rein it in and force a sharper focus. Subject matter obviously touches many tangential issues but this was kind of flighty and repetitive. Also: Big Chicks is not on Lawrence Ave and Lawrence and Argyle run parallel.

[Whimsy Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hornier than expected, but a fantastic read for my first year seminar college course! Has generated multiple essays, which is a compliment (I promise). Definitely keeping this one on my bookshelf.

[Ori Tsameret · Rating 4 out of 5]

gay

[Whitney · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this book at the Chicago Literary Festival this past year! Having lived in Boystown for the past few years, I was excited to learn more about the history of the first "gayborhood".

Overall I enjoyed this book. It's part history, part sociology, part ethnic studies. It was interesting reading about how some of the more well known bars have been able to survive as well as what the newer bars once were. Since this book was published in 2017, 2 more lesbian bars have opened in Chicago.

This book covered a lot in 250 pages. In my experience, these types of books are not really meant to give answers to complex social issues but to expand one's mind on how things are for some as well as how to change that. Jason talks to a variety of different people in this book so he's like their scribe. I appreciate this as a way to get other people's thoughts. These voices are pieces of what makes Boystown the way it is now and if you visit it a few times, you may see similarities in what the interviewees have observed.

My main gripe with many books written by gay men about queer communities is that they never write about lesbians and queer women enough. While I don't expect a gay man to write a lot about lesbians, he did spend a lot of time talking about straight women and how they spend time in Boystown even going as far as dedicating an entire chapter to the dynamics of gay men and straight women. It left a bad impression for me because lesbians and queer women have always been part of these communities but they are continuously erased or pushed aside due to various things rooted in misogyny and heterosexism.

The last chapter attempts to tie this all together in what I internalized as a "call to action" where Jason says that we have to support the community with our resources (bodies, money and time) and make our communities more inclusive of all genders. I agree! I hope to see this more in his future works.

[Octavia Cade · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've signed up to mailing list of the Chicago University Press, primarily because they send you a free ebook from their backlist every month, and this was one of those books. I probably wouldn't have read it otherwise, because it's so far out of my normal reading material, but that's the bright side of trying new things because it was genuinely interesting. Probably in large part because, although an academic himself, Orne was deliberately trying to produce a narrative that would be accessible to non-academics as well. (Frankly I think this should be the norm, but I've slogged through enough academic writing in my time to know that it isn't.)

Boystown is a sort of social survey of gay sexual behaviour in a Chicago neighbourhood known for its association with that lifestyle. Gay male behaviour, I should say, because of the many intersectionalities that Orne explores, the tendency for gay women to be excluded from Boystown is apparently ongoing. That being said, one of the main impressions I got here was a neighbourhood of extreme fluidity. The often transgressive behaviour of earlier times is apparently being softened by an increasing social acceptance of homosexuality, the gentrification of Boystown, and a number of other factors. Culture changes. Inhabitants change. Orne talks a lot about the "gay Disneyland" effect that Boystown is experiencing, the racial challenges, the social safaris of straight women. And honestly, that's why I like to read books like this: I learn new things about the ways in which other people live. Naturally that experience is somewhat limited, as I'm not only learning by proxy but I'm also distanced in any number of ways from the subjects of Orne's work... but it's valuable nonetheless.

And again: there are a few more scientists, both social and natural, who could stand to learn something from the presentation here. It's generally just very readable.

[willowdog · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a subject that needs a better sociologist to define the changes in the environment and life of queer Chicago. Jason doesn't look at the environment, he puts himself in it. If you are not in his "group" , you are derided. It is filled with derogatory messages of the various groups that inhabit gay in Chicago. His facts are often wrong when speaking about the history of the various bars in Chicago.

[Paul Rozovics · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have to say that I really enjoyed this book. As a native Chicagoan I've spent many a night and day in Boystown. Some of the author's views I quite agree with, although it did seem a little preachy at times. Since the book was published in 2015, many of the places mentioned have closed or transformed. It was nice though to be reminded of those spaces that provided what the author called sexy communities.

[Mitchell Clifford · Rating 4 out of 5]

This took me 14 months to read, but the juice was by far worth the squeeze. I can tell how much love, care, and passion Orne put into this labour of love. I’m honoured the time I had to sit with each chapters or in some cases parts of chapters at a time. One little gripe I had was the academic language was verbose at times, making it less accessible than I’d like. Lots of love to this text and Orne!

[Ai-Jia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Without sounding needlessly critical, I don't think it was wise for Orne to stick with what they knew when conducting this study. This work has a lot of potential, but the exclusion of queer women and genderqueer folk really limited its scope. I fully believe the inclusion of other perspectives from the nightlife in Boystown would have made this work more transformative.

[Noah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting insight that line up in many ways with my own thoughts, but did leave me considering new vantage points. Made me want to amp up my queerness moving forward!

[Cat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting enough attempt to blend radical politics and human desire for sexual connection etc., though the typographic issues are distracting.

[Arden McHugh · Rating 5 out of 5]

This articulated so many of my feelings about heteronormativity. I loved it! Grateful I get to read this for class <3