Honey, Honey, Miss Thang: Being Black, Gay, and on the Streets [Paperback]

Leon Pettiway (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 18, 1996

'I remember when I first hit the streets and I started coming downtown I was dressed up, right. I was wearing a white see-through dress. I had a pair of heels...Now, I'm tall. With heels on I'm even taller. I'm about six foot, three inches, and with a heel like this on, and it had a gold plate in the back and strapped around the ankle, hair blowing in the wind like a commercial. And I was walking across High Street and one car hit another car. I thought it was fantastic, because they were staring at me. One time I was waiting for a light, and I heard them whisper, 'That's a model'. And I was just strutting, you know' - Detra. Many straight Americans would never embrace homosexuals as neighbors, co-workers, or friends. Still less would they accept as equals those transgendered individuals who work the streets to provide themselves with drug money. This book seeks to change that perception. It celebrates the lives of Shontae, China, Keisha, Detra, and Monique, five Afro-American gay hustlers who struggle to survive and to maintain a life of dignity and value in the face of their drug use and criminal activity. As individuals they vary in terms of background, the manner in which they entered the transgendered world, and the nature of their initiation into the drug subculture. None of them has escaped the ravages of urban decline, crime, drugs, and poverty that accompany life in an inner city, but by the same token, none of them has capitulated to the stresses with which they live. It is impossible to read these accounts and not come away emotionally drained. As Monique explains, their lives take place in a world of chances. 'You take a chance on living or dying, on being hurt or not being hurt, a chance on finding a friend or finding an enemy'. It is from this world that their voices speak so eloquently about their families, hustling, sexuality, sexual abuse, friendship, and intimacy. By letting these women speak, Leon E. Pettiway evokes questions and encourages discussion and a re-evaluation of those who are labeled as deviant. Pettiway reaches beyond academic convention to offer a view with depth and emotion that mere statistics could never provide. While the poverty and often destructive lifestyle of these women may be gut-wrenching, their experiences reveal joy, pain, and the profound strength of the human spirit with which we can all identify. These lives have much to teach us about ourselves and those we label as 'other'. Author note: Leon E. Pettiway is Associate Professor, Department of Criminal Justice at Indiana University, Bloomington.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Using the first person accounts of five African American, drug-using, street-walking, cross-dressing gay hustlers, Pettiway, a professor of criminal justice at Indiana University, breaks free of some criminologists' tendency to view the marginalized as monolithically deviant, negative or hopeless. In his lengthy, moving introduction, Pettiway argues that the lives of his five subjects-Shontae, China, Keisha, Detra and Monique-are unique, individual experiences whose power, courage, faith, creativity and struggle for survival transcend mere sociological or criminological statistics. His goal is to present them "more nearly as they experience themselves" and to suggest policies that more closely address their understanding of who they are. The autobiographical chronicles reveal a complexity and depth, even when painful: Shontae, for instance, recalls being paid 50 cents to have sex with an older male cousin every Sunday and bargaining for an increase. Detra recalls her mother teaching her children how to bounce checks, and how one policeman, coming to confiscate stolen property, tried to keep the family from embarrassment by pretending he was taking it for repairs. The chronicles share common themes, such as strong bonds to mothers and, perhaps surprising to many, a strong streak of self-responsibility and accountability. China and Keisha echo each other, saying that they have no one to blame but themselves, while Shontae points out, "I didn't have a disturbed childhood. It was not family beatings... they barely cursed."

Copyright 1996 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

"Using the first person accounts of five African American, drug-using, street-walking, cross-dressing gay hustlers, Pettiway, a professor of criminal justice at Indiana University, breaks free of some criminologists' tendency to view the marginalized as monolithically deviant, negative or hopeless. ...His goal is to present them 'more nearly as they experience themselves' and to suggest policies that more closely address their understanding of who they are." --Publishers Weekly

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 270 pages
• Publisher: Temple University Press (September 18, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566394988
• ISBN-13: 978-1566394987
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,746,200 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars powerful, September 3, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Honey, Honey, Miss Thang: Being Black, Gay, and on the Streets (Paperback)

i grew up in a small southern town that was fantastically inhabited by what seemed an inordinate number of flamboyant black drag queens. as a child i marveled at their screaming visibility, and always kept one eye peeled for a glimpse of a sashaying stormy or randy ball or any of the other girls, now long dead. as a grown woman (gay, incidentally) living in a much larger, but still southern city, i remain fascinated by the miss thangs that i encounter in clubs and on street corners. this book is a raw and unflinching peek into the lives of five ordinarily extraordinary queens, who live their scarred and often dismaying lives with an amazing lack of self-pity and an equally amazing joie de vivre. i recommend!