Homophobic Violence and Corporality Among Homosexual Men: A Theoretical Proposal

This article deals with a theoretical proposal problematizing the participation of corporal materiality as a subject's analytical and constituent dimension via the phenomenon of homophobic violence (HV) among homosexual men. This proposal emerges from two stages: first, the identification of two gaps: the invisibility of the processes of HV in research and the invisibility of the constitutive role of the body in the processes of HV, as well as of the homosexual subject. The second stage is to cause tension between the analytical tools of cognitive social psychology and two feminist standpoints that suggest addressing corporal materiality, such as Sara Ahmed's concept of "orientation " and Judith Butler's "performativity, " to examine HV processes. And then, a proposal is constructed, which gives light on the body as a materiality that empowers or depowers the subject, together with the phenomenon of violence from its shape and movement. Second, it visibilizes a HV process scarcely addressed by social sciences. Finally, this article proposes, from a political and situated standing, that future studies can take charge of HV, corporality, and the present negative consequences of this phenomenon on LGBT subjects (gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transgender individuals).