Alcohol use is an integral part of the gay world. According to some
estimates, the rate of problem drinking is about three times higher
among gays than in mainstream society, but few researchers have
examined this phenomenon in depth.
Thomas S. Weinberg's ethnographic study provides new insight into
the role of drinking in the gay male community. Weinberg utilizes
interviewing and participant observation techniques in a variety of
drinking-related settings in the gay subculture of "Paradise City,"
the fictitious name of a large western city where he carried out
his research.
Emphasizing drinking as social behavior, Weinberg explores the ways
social contexts--such as bars, love relationships, and reference
groups--affect individual drinking patterns and concludes that
drinking is intimately entwined with friendship networks and
extended families in the gay world.
Weinberg is concerned not only with alcoholism but with variation
in alcohol use and changes in alcohol use over time. He employs the
concept of "career" to explain why and how an individual's drinking
might either increase or decrease over the course of his lifetime.
Letting his informants speak for themselves, Weinberg directs
attention to their own perspectives on the meaning of their
drinking behavior.
After creating a typology of drinkers, including self-defined as
well as researcher-defined alcoholics, Weinberg considers
alternative explanations for gay problem drinking. He thoroughly
explores the gay bar scene, its importance in gay life, and the way
that interactions within the bar environment affect drinking and
risk-taking, specifically as they relate to HIV. Weinberg also
looks closely atself-defined gay alcoholics and considers three
alternative explanations for gay problem drinking: the alienation
thesis, the influence of parental role models, and reference group
theory. He rejects the alienation thesis and the influence of
parental role models because these causal factors were not borne
out by his statistical correlations. Instead, Weinberg finds the
most powerful explanation in reference group theory, which links
individuals' behavior to the norms of the social groups they
identify with. Finally, he arrives at a processual model of gay
problem drinking based on his data analysis.
By comparing alcohol use in the homosexual and heterosexual
communities, Weinberg provides a new perspective on gay problem
drinking that will interest sociologists, psychologists, and
clinicians, as well as concerned lay readers in the gay community.
He cites examinations of large-scale survey research on tavern
attendance and drinking, ethnographic studies of bar behavior,
literature on special groups, and studies of marital interaction in
alcoholic families, concluding that gay drinking is a special
situation that only reference group theory and a processual model
adequately address. The closing chapter contains policy
recommendations for reducing alcohol use in the gay
community.
General
Imprint: |
Southern Illinois University Press
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Release date: |
December 1994 |
First published: |
December 1994 |
Authors: |
Thomas S. Weinberg
|
Dimensions: |
222 x 146 x 20mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Hardcover
|
Pages: |
193 |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-8093-1857-5 |
Categories: |
Books >
Social sciences >
Sociology, social studies >
General
|
LSN: |
0-8093-1857-1 |
Barcode: |
9780809318575 |
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