ABSTRACT

In this article, we explore queer migrants’ social networks and the role language plays in how they negotiate companionship, romance and sex within queer community and diasporic environments. We draw on interviews with 56 self-identified LGBT migrants from Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union living in Scotland, UK. In doing so, we bring into conversation and critically engage with perspectives from queer migration literature and from work on migrants’ social networks and language use. In the article, we show how language underpins access to English-speaking and ethnic social circles, and how it is powerfully bound up with emotions, affect and perceptions of social proximity or distance. We argue for the need to move beyond abstract notions of queer or diasporic communities, and for an exploration of queer migrants’ sociality grounded in their personal communities, social networks and the language(s) used within them. We argue that this approach can better capture queer migrants’ complex identity negotiations and diverse sources of support and belonging, without assuming the primacy of either sexuality or ethnicity.

摘要

在这篇文章中，我们探讨了酷儿移民的社交网络以及语言在他们如何在酷儿社区和散居环境中协商友谊、浪漫和性爱中的作用。我们对居住在英国苏格兰的 56 名来自中欧和东欧以及前苏联的自称 LGBT 移民进行了采访。在这样做的过程中，我们将来自酷儿移民文献以及有关移民社交网络和语言使用的工作的观点引入对话并批判性地参与其中。在这篇文章中，我们展示了语言如何支持进入说英语的和种族社交圈，以及它如何与情感、情感和社会接近或距离的感知密切相关。我们主张需要超越酷儿或散居社区的抽象概念，以及基于他们的个人社区、社交网络和其中使用的语言探索酷儿移民的社会性。我们认为，这种方法可以更好地捕捉酷儿移民复杂的身份协商以及支持和归属感的不同来源，而无需假设性或种族为首要因素。