The Queer Frontier: Male Same-sex Experience in Western Canada’s Settlement Era

Abstract

The essay documents and interprets episodes of male same-sex sexuality at different localities and moments in time across Western Canada during its settlement era, circa 1870-1945. Drawing upon the theoretical frameworks of Henri Lefebvre and Michel de Certeau, it seeks to explain same-sex experience in relation to the production, strategic, and tactical use of space. Utilizing court, jail, and police records, among other sources, it documents the recurrence of homoerotic desire across the West in this period, the places where men connected with other men, and their resourcefulness in accessing and reclaiming space to express their sexual imperatives. The data and analysis suggest a comparative laxity in moral regulation of male homoerotic relationships in the early frontier era, followed by entrenched police surveillance and repression by 1930-45. A provisional conclusion is that the frontier era afforded men some latitude within which to produce same-sex space, notwithstanding developing homophobic regimes and the risk of discovery, ostracism, and incarceration.

Spatially organizing future genders: An artistic intervention in the creation of a hir-toilet

“…Similarly to how Dick (2014) traces the history of how the public toilet facilitated lived space, and shows how it opened up for more fluid sexual relations and resisted heteronormativity, our study shows how institutionally, lived space that is agitated by academic/artistic intervention can disturb the most entrenched norms, revealing hitherto concealed possibilities for new human relations and future genders.…”

“…This subversion has a long history: toilets have figured as important spaces for liberation and alternative expressions of sexuality, as well as gender (Isaiah Green et al, 2010). Based on Lefebvre, Dick (2014) traces how male same-sex relationships in Western Canada between 1870 and 1945 created alternative spaces for sexual practices. Men actively made public toilets meeting places for homosexuals: ‘the closet’ became a ‘mental space’ for living out desires of same-sex relations (Dick, 2014: 18).…”

“…Based on Lefebvre, Dick (2014) traces how male same-sex relationships in Western Canada between 1870 and 1945 created alternative spaces for sexual practices. Men actively made public toilets meeting places for homosexuals: ‘the closet’ became a ‘mental space’ for living out desires of same-sex relations (Dick, 2014: 18). The public toilet facilitated lives overflowing and resisting neat alignments between the otherwise embedded heteronormativity of space, and instrumental attempts to order sexual expression.…”

2013 Canadian Historical Association Presidential Address: On Local History and Local Historical Knowledge

“…Au-delà des cas particuliers, les exemples les mieux documentés permettent d'éclairer l'histoire plus large des collectivités, des provinces, de la région et du pays 3 . Après avoir examiné les dossiers de plus de 80 poursuites pénales pour homosexualité dans les archives des quatre provinces de l'Ouest et de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada, je peux affirmer que chaque affaire était différente et que la dynamique qui prévalait dans chacune des collectivités touchées était aussi grandement variable 4 . Bien évidemment il y avait des points communs entre chaque affaire sur les plans régional, social, démographique et culturel, et l'agréga-tion de données pour tout l'Ouest est aussi utile pour interpréter des cas particuliers.…”

“…3 After examining more than 80 same-sex criminal court files from archives in the four western provinces and at Library and Archives Canada, I can report that every case was different, and the associated community dynamics within which these episodes occurred were also quite variable. 4 Of course there were crossregional social, demographic, and cultural commonalities, and aggregate data from across the West are also of value in interpreting the specific cases. However, to properly understand the dynamics of these examples, we need to try to grasp the attitudes, motivations, and actions of individual participants interacting in a specific place at a moment in time.…”