Queering your vocabulary

Written by Finula Greene

If language is fluid, evolving and contextual, what’s the harm in using the language of the oppressed? From pinkwashing to erasure, let’s unpack the difference between appreciation and appropriation – one word at a time.

Credit where credit’s due.

If you’re reading this, you’ve likely either observed or adopted into your vocabulary, the words: ‘slay’, ‘yas’, ‘periodt’ or ‘cunty’. These words have been widely adopted by mainstream culture over the last few years. Recently, I’ve even seen references to these words being classed as the ‘dialect of Gen Z’. However, to make that statement is to do an extreme disservice to the black, queer, and trans pioneers that contributed to their origin.

Today, it’s not uncommon to access news and new information through Instagram or TikTok: widely used social apps where viral sensations spread like wildfire and until overtaken by the next trend. The instantaneous and on-demand nature of this platform satiates the user’s need to learn more; discouraging audiences to look further or deeper through otherwise ‘traditional’ methods. This often means that we hear and see things that seem recent or appear trendy, but have actually existed for a long time, circulated by communities that perhaps weren’t safe to exist authentically without persecution.

If you’re familiar with the reality TV franchise, Ru Paul's Drag Race, then you would be aware that this language precedes modern social media. But, the history of this language goes much further than that; making RPDR a far cry from the communities that first used these terms. This vocabulary was born in the underground ballroom scene of 1970s New York. To use these words now, one needs to give credit to the black and brown, trans women and men that used these words as terms of endearment and self-expression in the safer spaces they were able to carve out for themselves and each other.

A brief return to ballroom culture.

While queer visibility is at an all time high now, queer and trans people have always existed, and the ballroom scene represents just one example of the ways that they existed: in the underground, mostly hidden through means of necessity, by creating small pockets of space to be truly seen in.

The ballroom scene of 1970s New York was not only a space to express one's gender identity through dress, dance and performance, but it also cultivated love and safety through chosen families. The scene created spaces where elders would care for younger, black trans kids who had been ousted from their family home, protecting them from the streets and also allowing them to exist in their full truths.

You may be thinking, “Fin, circulating the dialect of a once hidden community can only be a good thing.” But, unfortunately, black transgender women are still the most likely to experience domestic and sexual violence – and be murdered. Alarmingly, the average lifespan for this demographic is only 35 years. So, despite the commodification of their language, the safety and wellbeing of queer, black and trans communities is still in dire need of improvement.

The more accepted they become within our society, the more we start to see once-hidden lives and stories come into view. And while it is a delight to see this change – to know that younger generations are able to see themselves represented in wider society as loved, accepted and respected – it can also mean that certain parts of these identities will be appropriated and monetised in the new age; risking erasure of the deep rooted history of them.

Blame it on the algo.

This appropriation and monetisation of queer culture has become more prevalent in the age of social media, whose algorithms are decidedly biased in what they allow to go viral, leading to an inherent whitewashing of queerness. Without an understanding of intersectionality, this commodification increases instances of appropriation and erasure. Social media has shown us that visibility does not equal liberation. Especially when high street labels are peddling queer vocabulary or slang originating from within the black community, without any published advocacy, initiatives or recognition of these communities. If we take what is convenient and desirable from certain groups, without the continued work towards their liberation, then we are only serving patriarchal and capitalist interests: accepting the most digestible form of liberation as a kind of ‘as good as you will get’.

We are not liberated until all of us are liberated.

“But, Finula. Queers can marry in so-called Australia? Isn’t that enough?”, you ask. Dear readers, we cannot stop fighting for social justice once we’ve gained ‘enough’ of our own personal freedoms. Personally, as a queer, white, non-binary but cis-passing person living in Naarm (Melbourne), my life is pretty easy. I do not have to worry about persecution because I am queer, and my gender identity is not easily perceivable. But does that mean the fight is over? No, not at all.

I won’t deny that there are many benefits to visibility. If we do not trace back the roots of language, paying homage to the creators, it pushes us further away from prioritising their liberation. We cannot selectively take what appeals to us, without giving anything back. Using your privilege of visibility to appropriate a culture that is not yours, without fighting for their liberation is not visibility, it is erasure.

Because, while you may be thinking that in 2024, LGBTQIA+ rights are better than they have ever been, we must remember that it is a spectrum, and that many queer people exist within multiple intersections of marginalised identities. For instance, I am a part of the LGBTQIA+ community, but I am white, thin, attractive and pass as cisgender. While others part of the LGBTQIA+ community, can be POC, transgender, immigrant, sex workers; the list goes on. And although we fit under the same umbrella of ‘LGBTQIA+’, my right to exist and safety in the world is very different from theirs.

With all social justice activism, there is always a prominent whitewashing to the mainstream fight for rights. Among white members of a marginalised community, who live without any other forms of intersectional oppression, there is a scarcity mindset: that to ask for too much in one go is to guarantee nothing at all. This mindset leads to a fight that only benefits the already privileged members of that community: an important reminder that none of us are liberated until all of us are liberated.

Engaging in activism that is most convenient is not engaging in activism at all.

With all of that said, I am not telling you to erase certain jargon from your vocabulary. But, if you wish to use language rooted in a marginalised community, ask how you can give back to that community:

• Have you acquainted yourself with the history of this community, with the etymology of these words?
• If you are using these words on social media, do you follow creators from that community?
• Have you donated money to a cause that benefits these communities?

 Whatever it is you choose to do, all I hope for this LGBTQIA+ history month is to dig beneath the surface of Instagram and TikTok. Inform yourself of the lives and histories of others within and outside of your own community. And ask yourself what you could be doing to assist in their liberation.

Further Resources
Paris is Burning (Documentary) - Stream on Mubi, or rent on YouTube or AppleTV.
A League of Their Own (TV Series) - Stream on Amazon Prime
And the Category is… by Ricky Tucker (Book)
This Bridge Called my Back by The Combahee River Collective (Book)