Gay men in the performing arts: Performing sexualities within ‘gay-friendly’ work contexts

Abstract

An open access repository of Middlesex University research http://eprints.mdx.ac.uk Rumens, Nick and Broomfield, John (2014) Gay men in the performing arts: performing sexualities within 'gay-friendly' work contexts. Organization, 21 (3). pp. 365-382. ISSN 1350-5084 Final accepted version (with author's formatting)This version is available at: http://eprints.mdx.ac.uk/15539/ Copyright:Middlesex University Research Repository makes the University's research available electronically.Copyright and moral rights to this work are retained by the author and/or other copyright owners unless otherwise stated. The work is supplied on the understanding that any use for commercial gain is strictly forbidden. A copy may be downloaded for personal, non-commercial, research or study without prior permission and without charge.Works, including theses and research projects, may not be reproduced in any format or medium, or extensive quotations taken from them, or their content changed in any way, without first obtaining permission in writing from the copyright holder(s). They may not be sold or exploited commercially in any format or medium without the prior written permission of the copyright holder(s).Full bibliographic details must be given when referring to, or quoting from full items including the author's name, the title of the work, publication details where relevant (place, publisher, date), pagination, and for theses or dissertations the awarding institution, the degree type awarded, and the date of the award.If you believe that any material held in the repository infringes copyright law, please contact the Repository Team at Middlesex University via the following email address:eprints@mdx.ac.ukThe item will be removed from the repository while any claim is being investigated.See also repository copyright: re-use policy: http://eprints.mdx.ac.uk/policies.html#copy Gay men in the performing arts: performing sexualities within 'gay-friendly' work contexts AbstractBuilding on emerging research on 'gay-friendly' organisations, this article examines if and how work contexts understood and experienced as 'gay-friendly' can be characterised as exhibiting a serious breakdown in heteronormativity. Taking the performing arts as a research setting, one that is often stereotyped as 'gay-friendly', and drawing on in-depth interview data with 20 gay male performers in the UK, this article examines how everyday activities and encounters involving drama school educators, casters and peers are shaped by heteronormative standards of gay male sexuality. Adopting a queer theory perspective and connecting with an emergent queer theory literature in organisation studies, one concern articulated in this article is that heteronormative constructions of gay male sexualities constrain participants' access to work; suggesting limits to the abilities and roles gay men possess and are able to play. Another concern is that when gay male sexualities become normalised in performing work contexts, they reinforce organisational heteronormativity an...

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