The Gyalification of Man: The Expression of Male-Male Conflict in Jamaica and the Roots of Homoeroticism in the Political Ideology, Ontology and Praxis of White Supremacy

Abstract

Dis long time, gyal, mi never see youCome mek mi hold your hand(Long Time Gyal)Go down 'Manuel Road, gyal an' bwoyFi go bruk rockstone(Emmanuel Road)the friendly, affectionate use of gyal in the above lines from two Jamaican folk songs is understood throughout Jamaica and the Jamaican diaspora. The word gyal refers to young woman (usually unmarried) or female child (gyal pikni). Gyal-gyal in the Dictionary of Jamaican English is defined as a daughter: an affectionate appellation.1 An older woman is sometimes, out of affection and flattery, referred to as gyal. Gyal is also used pejoratively to designate woman who is regarded as promiscuous, loose and cheap.Gyal as an effeminate/emasculated male complexHowever, gyal is also used pejoratively by men in conflict to construct an effeminate/emasculated male complex in the belligerent patriarchal culture, social psychology and ideology of Jamaica. is this definition and use of gyal that is the focus of this essay. In the gyalification complex, variety of symbolic castrations are ritualistically performed by men on men in conflict; the purpose is to 'gyalificate' or to metaphorically turn their opponents into women (or mama-man dem or mampaala dem). Indeed, they attribute the perceived denigrated status of women to these men. The bus driver who exclaims, It mus' be ooman (that must be woman) in response to the driver of car whom he feels was bad him, is indulging in verbal castration. For him, real could and would not have been driving the car with such incompetence. Only woman drives in that way. As he accelerates and catches up with the car, the bus driver pushes his head through the window of his vehicle and shouts to the man driving the car below him, Hey gyal, buy yu buy yu licence?) (Hey girl, have you bought your licence?) The implication here is, first, that no man who successfully tested for his licence could have been driving like the man in the car, so the licence must have been obtained by bribe. Further, incompetence, in general, and especially in driving is associated with being woman. Thus, the man is clearly driving like woman or, more accurately, like gyal.In sense, there is fine distinction between gyal (girl/woman) and the gyal constructed in the bus drivers comments. This distinction is evident in the cultural/onto logical meaning of the gyal produced by birth and the gyal who is socially constructed in the belligerent plantation and neo/postplantation patriarchal Jamaican culture. The gyal who is socially constructed in male-male conflict, is placed at lower status than the gyal who motivated the his-her construction. This socially constructed gyal is, in sense, gender, passive male homosexual who, literally and or metaphorically, is the one who is penetrated in the sex act. The basis for the social construction of this third gender is decidedly sexism, including male-male homosexual prejudice. In this construction, the weakest, most vulnerable and dependent female, the girl (girl child, gyal pikni), is interwoven conceptually with the female genitalia (pussy, pussy hole, bombo, bombo hole), and the sanitary pad/sanitary napkin/sanitary towel (bombo klaat/pussy klaat/blood klaat) employed by the woman to absorb her menses, along with what is seen as the incompetent driving of the female, as well as the homosexual man (battybwoy/battyman), conceived as passive partner.One afternoon some years ago, I was in my study at home writing paper. Two construction workers on housing site next door clashed verbally. In response to threat from one, the other shot/shouted back, No pussy hole cyaan do mi dat an get 'way. Yu likkle blood klaat gyal. Yu pussy hole. (No emasculated man can do that to me and get away with it. You are like used sanitary pad. You are like woman's vagina.) These are the words of war - often leading to violence occasioning bodily harm and sometimes death, usually used in defending or denigrating the honour of men, of masculinity. …