Guy Davidson. 2012. Queer Commodities: Contemporary US Fiction, Consumer Capitalism, and Gay and Lesbian Subcultures

Abstract

For many years during the American gay liberation era, the American gay community was divided as to whether consumerist capitalism should be its identity marker. This conflict is the premise of Guy Davidson’s Queer Commodities, a book that presents an economic approach to understanding queer anthropology and, ultimately, queer activism. Davidson analyses five novels published in the post-liberation era that foreground the dynamic link between queer commodification and queer characteristics as depicted in fictional subcultures. He demonstrates that, despite the ongoing debate pervading gay culture, there is in fact insufficient reason to fully approve or disapprove of this association of commodity cultures with same-sex identities. He suggests further that queer identities and desires are historically and meaningfully entangled with commodification, giving rise to urban subcultures that repudiate some of capitalism's detrimental effects.