|
|
Article: Cowboys on the cover of a magazine.(PHOTO ESSAY)(Essay)
- Article from:
- The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide
- Article date:
- November 1, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2008 Gay & Lesbian Review, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
THE RECENT DEATH of Heath Ledger, who made his way into gay cultural history by playing a cowboy with homosexual tendencies in Brokeback Mountain, brings to mind the odd but ongoing presence of the cowboy in gay imagery for more than half a century. The image of the cowboy is a powerful one in American history. Since the emergence of gay magazines in the 1950's, there has been a brisk use of cowboy imagery in the marketing of their allure.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Paradoxically, it was the closing of the American frontier, a development that the U.S. Census Bureau officially declared in 1890, that opened the door for the legend of the West to emerge, ...