{"product_id":"becoming-lesbian","title":"Becoming Lesbian","description":"\u003cb\u003eA landmark analysis of how a marginalized subculture used modern media to transform public attitudes toward sexual desire.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e In \u003ci\u003eBecoming Lesbian\u003c\/i\u003e, historian Tamara Chaplin argues that the history of female same-sex intimacy is central to understanding the struggle to control the public sphere. This monumental study draws on undiscovered sources culled from cabaret culture, sexology, police files, radio, TV, photography, the Minitel (an early form of internet), and private letters, as well as over one hundred interviews filmed by the author. \u003ci\u003eBecoming Lesbian\u003c\/i\u003e demonstrates how women of diverse classes and races came to define themselves as lesbian and used public spaces and public media to exert claims on the world around them in ways that made possible new forms of gendered and sexual citizenship. Chaplin begins in the sapphic cabarets of interwar Paris. These venues, she shows, exploited female same-sex desire for profit while simultaneously launching an incipient queer female counterpublic. Refuting claims that World War II destroyed this female world, Chaplin reveals instead how prewar sapphic subcultures flourished in the postwar period, laying crucial groundwork for the politicization of lesbian identity into the twenty-first century.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eBecoming Lesbian\u003c\/i\u003e is filled with colorful vignettes about female cabaret owners, singers, TV personalities, writers, and activists, all brought to life to make larger points about rights, belonging, and citizenship. As a history of lesbianism, this book represents a major contribution to modern French history, queer studies, and genealogies of the media and its publics.","brand":"The University of Chicago Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54220827459928,"sku":"9780226836553","price":34.99,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0278\/1295\/4195\/files\/9780226836553.jpg?v=1778499022","url":"https:\/\/agendabookshop.com\/products\/becoming-lesbian","provider":"Agenda Bookshop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}