Lesbian Identity and Community: Recent Social Science Literature

Abstract

This article reviews recent social science literature on the relationship between lesbian identity and community. Specifically, it considers how lesbian communities both affirm and challenge the individual lesbian's sense of self. There is much in the autobiographical literature on lesbian experience that makes us aware that lesbian communities enhance that sense of self. These communities provide a haven or home in a hostile or distrusting outside world. They lend support for what is frequently a stigmatized life-style choice. They command recognition of a distinctively lesbian sensibility-a sensibility that is unusual because of the value it places on intimacy between women. Yet lesbian communities, along with their virtues, also pose crucial identity problems for their members. At times, they seem to threaten as well as affirm individual identity. The problems posed by lesbian communities are similar to those found in many other social groups and especially in minority groups, where efforts to achieve group solidarity and cohesiveness often conflict with efforts to foster individuality and to tolerate internal deviance.