David A.B. Murray: Flaming Souls: Homosexuality, Homophobia, and Social Change in Barbados.

Joseph, Janelle ; Crichlow, Wesley

David A.B. Murray

Flaming Souls: Homosexuality, Homophobia, and Social Change in Barbados

Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012, 144 pp.

In his new book, David Murray focuses exclusively on the Caribbean island of Barbados and the spectre of homosexuality therein. He visits the National HIV/AIDS Commission meetings, listens to call-in talk radio shows, and documents transnational cellphone love affair dramas. He notes the burgeoning interest in lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered rights as human rights across the world, and the regular vilification of the Caribbean region generally (and Jamaica more specifically) as one of the most homophobic places on earth, which has "potentially serious economic and political repercussions for these places, cultures, or nations that were found 'guilty' of such discriminatory practices" (5). He set out to discover how homophobia really operates in Barbados. Who are the perpetrators, victims, and resisters? He unravels some of the complex historical, social, political, and economic terrains through which gender and sexuality are produced and argues that the gay male gaze is simultaneously central and marginal to the formation of the Barbadian imagined community.

In this text, Murray effectively communicates two main ideas. First, he explains that homophobia is certainly not universal throughout Barbados. He cites a number of gay interlocutors who expressed feeling supported by peers, family members, and co-workers who have "no issue" with their sexuality. At the same time, others reported (increasing) hostility, harassment, and violence. His analysis shows the value of not painting the entire Caribbean or even all of Barbados with the broad strokes of a homophobic brush. Similarly, there is no single identification, definition, or performance of sexuality, desire, or gender in daily Bajan (Barbadian) life. He explains that differently gendered men, depending also on their race, religion, and class, are treated/perform differently and should not be judged based on North American queer life, (trans-)gender definitions, or activist standards.

Second, he shows the global dimensions of both homophobia and homosexuality. Increasing homophobia, Murray suggests, is directly related to anti-globalization and anti-imperialism sentiments in the nation, which are concomitant with realignments that have resulted in a submissive, subordinated, and "hyperfeminised" economy in Barbados. Many locals have no interest in taking their moral cues from Euro-America, whose history of causing suffering and inequalities in the Caribbean and elsewhere are less than exemplary. Relatedly, the perception of the Caribbean as homophobic (read: backwards, uncivilized) is a continuation of a modernist, racist perception of the region. Murray (Chapter 3) shows the complexity of engaging in human rights debates in Barbados--there is nothing universal about them despite the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights--particularly where different aspects of the declaration contradict each other. Where it is impossible to defend both individual freedoms and the public interest, lawmakers encourage protection of the status quo. He argues that just as sexual and gender identities are made locally but always in relation to the global, rights must be made locally, framed in terms of vernacular based on internal debates that are informed by global practices--not imposed from the international (read: Euro-American) community.

The book could be improved substantially with a deeper critique of the international gay human rights movement and its lack of theoretical engagement with the nationalistic position of Barbados. Nationalisms are but one set of political positions across a wide-ranging set of heterogeneous Black conservative communities. In Barbados, human rights narratives of Black communal solidarity and bio-nationalism are shored up by discourses of family, sexual taboos, religion, morality, and so on, which are called upon to legitimize the rejection of same-sex sexual practices and identities. Murray alludes to the perception that gay rights in the Caribbean are driven by white western colonial interests, not those of Black/Caribbean interests. A deeper critique of foreign human rights groups and agencies working in the Caribbean is critical if the agenda is to be moved forward by Caribbean people. What would the language and process look like if Bajans, and Caribbean people more broadly, led the struggle for gay human rights? Murray provides one example of how indigenous popular culture is used to raise human rights issues as they pertain to gender structures and sexual practices. Pampalam, an annual comedy show that satirizes current trends and political events in Barbados, featured a calypso-singing drag queen. Her musical lyrics described her interest in the fact that the politicians who condemned prostitution by day were the same to visit her at night (50-51). More examples such as this regarding issues of homosexuality and homophobia would help to explain how locals are understanding and resisting the status quo.

Murray does not answer all of the 15 questions he asks at the outset of the book. In part, this failure was inevitable because each question could consume an entire text on its own. For example, he does not answer his question: "[H]as there always been homophobia in the Caribbean? Might it be problematic to use this term to represent and analyze sexual difference and discrimination in the Caribbean? How do we go about researching the veracity of these kinds of claims?" (6). This is a symptom of one of the book's broader challenges. It is history-, theory-, and methodology-lite. For decades, anthropologists and sociologists have heralded the need for more intensive self-reflexivity to situate the story told as rhetoric, not report, and to demonstrate the personal experiences and positionality of the researcher as integral to the data collection, interpretation, and representation processes. Unfortunately, the reader learns very little about Dr. Murray other than the fact that he is "cognizant of [his] own position as a white male gay-identified researcher located in a North American university, writing about sexuality and gender in a post-colonial nation state that is situated (albeit problematically) in the global South" (12-13). We also learn that his appearance was read as openly gay due to socially constructed homophobic gendered stereotypes of the "'broke wrist' (floppy wrist) action, the overly tight shirt, and short shorts" (102).

So how did his privileges, limitations, and appearance affect his relationships during his fieldwork and the reading of Bajan homophobic nuances? For example, the second half of the book focuses on the lived experience of "invisible" self-identified gay men and the more publicly visible "queens" (a local term for effeminate men) in Barbados. He conveys the attitudes of a British-born, gay, white male, "Edward" (Chapter 4), who is now a Barbadian citizen and bed and breakfast owner. Edward contrasted the "poor, coloured, ignorant, not-to-be-trusted, usually mysterious, and/ or exotic colonized subject versus the educated, wealthy and sexually and intellectually enlightened white Euro-American male" (60). Although the critique of this binary is well laid out and Murray is clear that white tourist zones are not the only liberated gay spaces on the island, the reader is left wondering about the author's impressions, thoughts, and experiences of gay tourism. If Murray was able to become friends with men such as "Omar" (Chapter 7), a young local black man who emphasizes being discrete about his sexual identity, how did he negotiate his flamboyant appearance in public, without "outing" the Bajan men who must police their masculinity and safety?

The book is admittedly only about gay men and "queens," which begs for an analysis of non-heterosexual women in the nation. Addressing the experiences of women would add to the claim of the diversity of gender performances and levels of homophobia in Barbados. Murray could also have provided more detail about the "she-she" bands of Cropover (carnival) and self-identified gay men living with HIV/AIDS, as these are two of the ghosts that haunt the imagined heteronormative Barbadian community, which prides itself on notions of respectability. Attention to these figures would allow Murray to add further complexity to the prevalent assumption of Barbados as a homophobic location. Further, the author could begin to ask what an indigenous struggle for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered human rights in Carnival and health settings would look like. "Postcolonial" thinkers must not only analyze and describe the oppressive phenomenon of homophobia, but must also devise strategies for effectively combatting and hopefully eradicating its damaging aspects.

In conclusion, Flaming Souls contributes to the body of Caribbean Black gay, queer, and cultural theory in the Caribbean and the diaspora. There are few book-length examinations of homophobia and homosexuality in the Caribbean, and this examination of a particular island nation, Barbados, demonstrates the need for even more cogently theorized understandings of sexual and gender politics. The book is a formidable example of intersectional analysis that addresses issues of race, gender, class, global politics, economy, medical and human rights discourse, and religion. If it was the author's intention to leave the reader wanting more, he succeeded.

Janelle Joseph and Wesley Crichlow, University of Ontario Institute of Technology