Leisurely Lesbians in a Small City in South Africa

Over the past two decades, particularly in post-industrial societies, the geographies of gay men’s and, to a lesser extent, gay women’s lives have received considerable research attention. A central research interest has been the mapping of gay geographies of leisure. There are, however, fewer studies in the academic record about gay leisure geographies in the developing world context, particularly in Africa. This investigation aims to address an aspect of this investigatory oversight by looking through the lens of white gay women in the city of Bloemfontein, South Africa. The study maps white gay women’s leisure-seeking and positions their (sexual) desire(s) relative to other homosexual and heterosexual leisure geographies. A highly complex and contradictory set of spatial and temporal patterns and practices emerge in which desire and repulsion are often in close proximity located in a number of leisure, retail, work, and private spaces. In addition, these spaces are inhabited by a range of different identity cohorts according to gender, gender performativity, class, and race.