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CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

LGBT, an abbreviation for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender, is known

as a minor sexual orientation group. LGBT can also be used as an umbrella term

for referring to a certain gender and sexual identity topics. At first, this minor group

was called homosexual in the 1960s. However, it was replaced with the term ‘gay’

because homosexuality only belongs to certain group and is not accurate to

represent all of the queer gender and sexual identity. In the past, LGBT already

existed, but people were very strict to LGBT. One example of how strict and harsh

people to a homosexual individual is a Sodomy Case by Richard Cornish in 1625.

He was reported on charges of sodomizing a male ship steward and was sentenced

to hang (Crompton 1976, 288). This case becomes the example of discrimination

towards homosexual in former days.

There have been many issues and cases about the acceptance of LGBT issues

in society, such as hate speech, discrimination, and negative attitudes towards

LGBT individuals. The negative treatment makes the minor individuals hard to

express themselves in society and causes them to experience mental health

problems and difficulties in accepting themselves as they are. In the 1920s, The

Society for Human Rights was formed by Henry Gerber in Chicago as the first

formal organization in the United States that support gay rights (Elliot 2015). The

Human Rights Campaign (HRC) was created in 1980 by activist Steve Endean as a

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political organization to support and promote equality of LGBT individuals and

other LGBT communities. It was also known as the wealthiest national gay and

lesbian civil rights faction in Washington D.C., United States. Another community

to support LGBT was the Independent Gay Forum (IGF), an online writer and

activists’ group which focused on expanding gay and lesbian legal equality. In

1968, a man named Frank Kameny made a slogan “Gay is Good” to counter the

social stigma and showed that being gay is a positive moral good (Ball 2010). In

1969, a riot arose between the LGBT crowd and police officers. This uproar was

known as The Stonewall Riots. The riots became the stepping-stone for LGBT

individuals to obtain their rights. From here on, there were many promotions and

parades to bring awareness and help LGBT people so that they could come out from

their “closet”. Since then, the radical politics of gay pride have increasingly wanted

to be “out and proud” in all contexts.

The concept of gay pride makes an explicit shift from shame to pride. LGBT

is no longer afraid to embrace their sexuality in public. A year after the riots,

activists began to organize an event to commemorate the incident. On June 28,

1980, the Christopher Street Liberation Day March was held to celebrate the first

anniversary of the Stonewall uprising (Solomon 2019). Eventually, June is chosen

to commemorate the Stonewall Riots by celebrating LGBT Pride Month every year

to recognize the impact of the riots for LGBT which people have received. The

philosophy of gay pride assumes that sexuality not only is but also should be the

primary source of identification, community, and self-esteem (Connell 2015, 24).

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The corollary concept of “out and proud” links pride to self-disclosure, so that

coming out and pride become nearly synonymous.

In the 21st century, the acceptance of LGBT has spread all around the world.

A new study conducted by Andrew R. Flores (2019) called Global Acceptance

Index ranked 141 countries around the world regarding the relative level of social

acceptance of LGBT rights and individuals. Eighty (80) countries have increased

the recognition of LGBT rights for individuals. Meanwhile, forty-six (46) countries

declined the acceptance, and fifteen (15) countries have not experienced changes

(Dowd 2018). This number shows that there is a massive change regarding LGBT

acceptance among people all over the globe. Same-sex desire, once the “love that

dare not speak its name,” is increasingly accepted and celebrated in many parts of

the United States and the world. In Georgia, for example, since November 23rd

1998, same-sex sexual activity has been legalizing by Powell v. The State, Supreme

Court of Georgia (EQUALDEX n.d.). While it is stated by The New York Times

(2015) that New York has the largest gay populations in size with 756.000 people,

identify themselves as gay, lesbian, lesbian, or transgender.

According to [Link] (2019), there are more than ten cities that

celebrate “LGBT Pride Parade”, which is a ceremonial against violence and mainly

about discrimination towards the LGBT individual to promote their equality rights

and celebrate gender variance and sexual diversity. Even until 2019, LGBT Pride

Month was still held all around the world in many ways. People were holding a

parade in many big cities in the United States or promote it through social media.

It shows enough how postmodern society has been quite receptive to support

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LGBT. This condition is supported by the increasing number of adults which are

identified as LGBT (Cohen, et al. 2018, 8). It is because these millennial might be

found in government or other important positions within the society. Thus, their

existence is influential to the development of LGBT acceptance by bringing

awareness to a larger mass. One of the influences brought by the development of

LGBT is shifting from heteronormative society to homonormative society.

Heteronormativity is about privilege as the right and normal sexual norms. This

norm became the standard that is valid within society. It is mostly about sexual

interaction between the opposite sex, man and woman, as the normal one (Berlant

and Warner 1998). This heteronormative norm is rooted in society's mind, which

causes people to judge others sexuality as good and bad one based on this

normativity. This norm somehow cannot cover a group of people outside

heterosexuals, such as homosexual individuals. The existence of heteronormativity

norms is often used to discriminate non-heteronormative because they are different

from the standards. They are considered as peculiar because they do not act the way

heterosexuals believe. Discrimination, negative, and harmful treatments towards

the non-heteronormative are the ways for heteronormative people to criticize LGBT

individuals.

Society has become more accepting, especially people in America, which

leads to a change in how people react and treat homosexual individuals. LGBT

people are no longer seen as a group of people who should be alienated from

society. This is due to the uprising of Neoliberalism in United States which creating

many social movements including gay liberation. Begin in 1930s, The New Deal

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was sought as a respond to the needs to recovery and relief from the Great

Depression, developed by the Roosevelt administration (Wei 2014). However, it

was ended up being torn down as it created a new vision of national and world

order. This vision of inequality, public austerity, competition, and “law and order”

are known as Neoliberalism. Neoliberalism is developed as a response to global

changes that happened in the Western institutions and aimed to take over the limited

states welfare state to increase corporate profit rates. The profit was taken from

other social uses, which ended up increasing economic inequality. This everyday

capitalism led to the supportive towards upward redistribution. However, it also led

to an increase of inequalities in many sectors. It then become the core of many civil

rights movement and equality politics. The expanding of the social movements

caused by neoliberalism aimed to improve the inequality and injustice conditions

in the United States. These movements were creating innovative critiques to

broaden human’s constraints. These movements are civil right and black nationalist

insurgencies, anti-racist and anti-imperialist mobilizations, radical labor activism,

the women’s liberation movement, lesbian feminism, black feminism, and gay

liberations.

A few years later, the social movement caused by neoliberalism leads to the

establishment of a new term called Homonormativity. This term views homosexual

as something normal and has been accepted among society. This norm adopts

heteronormativity values in which what heterosexual individual gets can be applied

to the homosexual individual. It is applicable to make same sex marriage possible.

From the survey conducted by Cohen and team (2018), the public has supported

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marriage equality, including for LGBT couples as one of LGBT rights movements.

In 2015, same sex couples had a fundamental right to marriage from the Supreme

Court. These conditions show a good signal for LGBT individuals to start having a

relationship and being open with it since most of the society has become to see their

relationship acceptable within the society in the same way as heterosexual couple

and their relationship. Homosexuality issue can reach its current condition as the

result of LGBT movements in which this movement is also possible due to the

development of neoliberalism. One of the acts to bring awareness about LGBT

among society is through literary works. Literary works can be the way to voice out

and also subtly give others knowledge about LGBT issue (Blackburn, Clark and

Nemeth 2015). In this context, as homonormativity can be considered as a new

advancement, literary works can help to deliver the values contained by

homonormativity. Homonormativity as a new theme for cultural productions might

help in promoting LGBT. By using homonormativity as its theme, it can be an

insight for people who read the literature enlightenment of the new attitudes and

perspective towards LGBT. It can be a good example to practice it in real life. This

changes can be a huge advantage to homosexual individual, especially the young

one to come out to public without having to be afraid anymore.

There have been many novels released related the issue of LGBT such as

Middlesex (2002) by Jeffrey Eugenides, Call Me by Your Name (2007) by André

Aciman, Simon vs. Homo Sapiens Agenda (2015) by Becky Albertalli, and What If

It’s Us (2018) by Becky Albertalli and Adam Silvera. This recurring theme in the

literature shows that awareness about LGBT has increased in literature. One novel

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that brings up a topic about homonormativity is What If It’s Us (2018) by Becky

Albertalli and Adam Silvera. It was released on October 09 2018. It was a story

about Arthur Seuss and Ben Alejo. Arthur moved out to do an internship at his

mother’s law firm in New York. There, the universe set him to meet a boy named

Ben but then they got separated. However, the universe played with them and once

again played its role and united them. In the novel, the other characters surround

them were supportive of the two main characters. They did not see Arthur and Ben

as a peculiar individual that should be excluded from society. Instead, their

surroundings treated them as to how they were supposed to be treated, a normal

individual.

What If It’s Us (2018) is categorized as a Young Adult literature as it talks

about two teenage boys and the aim readers is teenager. Young adult literature

theme is becoming an important genre in literature as it increasing the adolescent

literacy value. Addressing the teenage interests and needs in the literature, it might

attract the readers by made it relevance and valuable to the lives of its readers,

specifically during their coming of age period. Coming of age is a term used to

describe a child transition becoming an adult in which teenagers are seeking for a

place in society (Millard 2007, 15). Thus, Young adult literature is important ‘asset’

to the development of their physical emotion, as ‘asset’ means a factor to promoting

the positivity in the development of a teenager in their coming of age period.

Promoting the empathy, compassion, and understanding of the teenage by

portraying their exterior and interior lives, young adult giving to them an image of

role models, develop their personal philosophy of being, frame of references of the

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world they inhabit, and to determine that is right and wrong (Cart 2008). A young

adult novel discussing homosexuality and Homonormativity may give the readers

the essence of affirmation and reassurance during their coming of age. Teenagers

during the search of their place among the society may find this theme helpful as it

can also encourage them to not only find their place, but also to understand who

they are. It would eventually lead them to admit who they are.

What If It’s Us (2018) is the fourth book of both Albertalli and Silvera.

Albertalli received two awards for her first book, Simon vs. Homo Sapiens Agenda:

American Library Association’s William C. Morris Award in 2015 as the first-time

author writing for teenagers (Hetter 2016), and in 2017 German Youth Literature

Prize for a brilliant debut (Baker 2016). Meanwhile, Silvera, known as the New

York Times best-selling author of They Both Die at the End (2017) got an award

from ALA (American Library Association) in 2016 in the category Young Adult

Fiction.

In this book, Albertalli and Silvera portrayed such a supportive environment

for Arthur and Ben for being homosexuals. Thus, this study is important to

investigate the shifting from heteronormativity to homonormativity. This study uses

a theory by Lisa Duggan about the new homonormativity. In her book The Twilight

of Equality? Neoliberalism, Cultural Politics, and the Attack on Democracy (2003).

This analysis can also be considered as gay criticism since the main characters are

gay. Gay criticism does not only focus on the effort to define homosexuality. The

study of gay criticism often put the attention that falls to the subheading of gay

sensibility, which influences the way one sees the world, oneself and others. It also

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includes awareness of being different from the dominant or major group and

complex feeling from the ongoing social oppression (Tyson 2015, 314).

There has not been any adequate study analyzing homonormativity issues,

especially in literature. However, there is a journal by Julian Carter titled Gay

Marriage and Pulp Fiction: Homonormativity, Disidentification, and Affect in Ann

Bannon’s Lesbian Novels (2009). This journal explores the ways in which lesbian

character in Bannon’s novel identified as “homonormative” or “normative

lesbians”. This journal seeks to meddle discussion about homonormativity by

investigating its imaginative and affective dimensions. Most lesbians in Bannon’s

novel obey the dominant culture that expects them as a normal woman ought to be

and do. Marriage here works as a strategy for a backup plan so that white queer’s

can survive without being judged for their actual identity. In contrary, this study

discusses about a gay couple and aims to point out a more developed society in

which they treat homosexual individual without any hidden intention. Rather than

being a “mask”, homonormativity in the novel is considered as the improvement of

the LGBT movement. Therefore, the existence of What If It’s Us (2018) brings a

new insight towards LGBT issues. There is a very few analysis and journal article

that discuss about this issue in this object as it was only recently published.

Specifically, in Universitas Airlangga, there has not been any analysis and journal

article that discussing this issue in this object. In addition, this study attempts to

bring awareness of homonormativity portrayed in the novel.

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1.2 Statement of the Problem

According to the background of the study, this study analyzes Arthur Seuss

and Ben Alejo as the main characters in the novel What If It’s Us by Becky

Albertalli and Adam Silvera. There is one main question proposed in this study.

1. How is homonormativity presented in What If It’s Us (2018)?

1.3 Objective of the Study

This study aims to get one objective answered. The objective is answered

according to the statement of the problem. This is one main objective proposed in

this study.

1. To examine homonormativity presented in What If It’s Us (2018).

1.4 Significance of the Study

The significance of this study is to depict homonormativity represented in

literature and the reaction of both the main characters and society through

homonormativity in Becky Albertalli and Adam Silvera’s novel titled What If It’s

Us. This study aims to show to society that homosexuality is no longer an odd issue

to be discussed in daily conversation. In further action, this study is expected to be

able to bring sexuality awareness to the readers, especially for young-adult readers.

Young-adult readers are the aim readers as this novel might promoting the positivity

in the development of teenager’s characters and gives an image role models. This

study can contribute to the analysis of homosexuality issue to gender studies,

especially in literature. Specifically, to academics in English Department

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Universitas Airlangga, this study can be the start for homonormativity discussion

since this study initiates this issue for the first time in Universitas Airlangga scope.

Hopefully, this can be an insightful perspective for readers and perceive wisely the

message that this novel wants to deliver.

1.5 Definition of Key Terms

1. Heteronormativity: The concept and belief that being heterosexual is the

norm; considered as normal and natural within

society; a sexual interaction between man and

women, outside that is considered as unnatural or

wrong (Berlang 2012).

2. Homonormativity: The beliefs which does not compete with

heteronormative assumptions and institution,

but sustain heteronormative. It beliefs the

possibility of gay demobilized privatized and

constituency in consumption and domesticity

(Duggan 2003).

3. Homosexuality: Refers to sexual relationship between people with

the same sex. Also relate to one’s sexual desire, same-

sex behaviors and how they define themselves

(Cardoso and Werner 2003).

4. Queer Study: A study that includes both analysis connected

with gender and sexuality (Beasly 2005).

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