Rites of passing by.

Smith, Charles Michael

Backward Glances: Cruising the Queer Streets of New York and London

by Mark W. Turner

Reaktion Books (London). 191 pages, $27 (paper)

BACKWARD GLANCES is not a memoir but a scholar's exploration of something gay men often do without a second thought. Cruising is an age-old activity, not necessarily the exclusive domain of gay men, but one that gay men have undoubtedly developed and refined in unique ways. Because gay men have for centuries been perceived as sexual outlaws, their rituals of cruising have developed techniques designed to protect the participants from being noticed by outsiders or entrapped by the authorities.

The book's author, Mark W. Turner, is an American who teaches in the Department of English at Kings College in London. He examines the phenomenon of cruising through photography, letters, poetry, journalism, pornography, and fiction. Many of his specific observations about cruising ring true.

For example, in areas where people share the same space that has multiple uses, it's not always easy to determine who's cruising and who is not. Is the man at the department store window searching for a suit or for another man? This ambiguity is captured as well in the cover photo. A young man on the street is looking back at two other men with their arms around each other, who appear unaware that he's observing them. Is this a gay man who's attracted to one or both of the men, or a straight man astounded by such an open display of gay affection? Is he cruising or is he more of a voyeur? In fact, cruising has elements of both voyeurism and exhibitionism, which also involve visual observation and display. But while voyeurism and exhibitionism are both one-sided--the former is surreptitious, the latter self-centered--cruising is a reciprocal activity that's all about reading the other guy's reactions and responding accordingly.

One of Turner's key observations about cruising struck me as worthy of closer examination. First, full disclosure: I am someone who has worked in a gay men's bathhouse and who has spent a lot of time in city parks and porno theaters. In Turner's view, bathhouses are places that "have the potential to level out social determinants such as class." In my experience, "class" may be the only social determinant that's leveled, for all the other social considerations still come into play: race, age, looks, physical fitness, mannerisms, and so on. Elsewhere in the book Turner quotes another writer who sees cruising as "a type of brotherhood far removed from the male bonding of rank, hierarchy, and competition that characterizes much of the outside world." If only that were true! Anyone who has spent any time in a cruising area knows that there is a pecking order, as it were, one largely determined by physical looks. The young, the good-looking, the muscular, the well-endowed are the most highly favored, while those who don't measure up in these criteria will often meet with rejection (which is communicated in many nonverbal ways, such as turning one's back or lowering the head). For those who are old, fat, or effeminate, there is no "cruising democracy."

Turner makes it clear from the outset that his study is limited by its focus on mostly white, male, middle-class men. Despite his largely Eurocentric approach--though he does devote two pages to black writer Samuel Delany's Times Square porn theater experiences--he understands that "cruising as a street practice needs to be far more fully considered in relation not only to issues of gender but also to race and ethnicity." That might be the subject of another book, but Backward Glances is worthy of our attention, providing considerable insight into a largely invisible--and certainly a very lively--feature of the urban landscape.

Charles Michael Smith is a freelance writer and book reviewer living in New York City.