Maricón is a Spanish-language slur used primarily to refer to gay, effeminate or cowardly men.
The word maricón is particularly offensive in places like Puerto Rico, Mexico, and other Latin American countries. Like the term queer, for many, it has been transformed to defy its original meaning and intent.[1]
In a 2007 press release, GLAAD referred to maricón as a "derogatory slur" that is "vulgar, defamatory and unacceptable".[2]
puto, joto.[2]
History edit
The first record of the word maricón was in 1517, in Bartolomé Torres Naharro's comedy play Comedia Serafina, included in the compilation book Propalladia.[3] It is derived from Marica, which was the most popular diminutive for the name María (i.e. Mary) during the so-called Spanish Golden Age.[3] The term was used to criticize men who were perceived as effeminate, equating them with women and thus referencing the popular feminine given name.[3] Maricón was used for a long time alongside marica—registered years later in 1594—and mariquita, whose first record is much more difficult to determine, as it is also one of the names for ladybird beetles in Spanish.[3] While maricón and its variants were used as equivalent to effeminate men, puto was the vulgar term to refer to "sodomites" (i.e. gay men).[3]
https://books.google.com.ar/books?id=bOsIwTWaciAC&pg=PT244s
https://books.google.com.ar/books?id=jp8FEAAAQBAJ&pg=PT298#v=onepage&q&f=false
https://books.google.com.ar/books?id=uoAnBwAAQBAJ&pg=PA251
According to the Royal Spanish Academy, the word marica means effeminate and is also used to refer to a man that is a homosexual, or is "timid, lacking courage, cowardly or fearful."[4]
In Cuba and Puerto Rico, homosexuals are coded within linguistically gendered terms like maricón, but also loca, ponca, pato (lit. 'duck') and the less common pájaro (lit. 'bird').[1]
It is generally accepted that maricón is a translation of fag(got) and, therefore, also a homphobic slur, although some leeway is given to dialectal variation or misunderstanding of this status.[2] For instance, some Spanish-speaking communities have claimed that maricón and fag(got) are not equivalent terms, with the former meaning jerk, wimp, or sissy.[2]
Maricón in English edit
Reappropriation edit
In the mid-1930s, Miguel de Molina was the most popular actor in Spain and began to be the object of homophobic persecution, eventually going into exile in Latin America. In an oft-quoted statement, after being yelled mariquita during a performance in Madrid, he replied: "Not a mariquita, a maricón, which sounds like a vault."[3][5][6]
https://www.eldiario.es/opinion/zona-critica/teoria-marica-insulto-bandera_129_3500224.html
https://www.fg2021.eventos.dype.com.br/trabalho/view?ID_TRABALHO=559
https://books.google.com.ar/books?id=WPTNdDKHDm4C&pg=PA25
http://www.scielo.org.mx/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1870-11912019000100110
Some homosexuals reconceptualize offensive terms such as maricón to mean not only something inherently positive, but strong, and distinctive from gay.[1] Many prefer marica over gay as a way to enlarge their identity beyond the concept of sexual orientation, and to criticize the assimilation and normalization of sexual diversity—such as the so-called "pinkwashing" and "pink capitalism" phenomenons—which started with the rise of Neoliberalism in the late 20th century.[7] Chilean writer Pedro Lemebel reflected in 1997 that: "Gayness joins the power, it does not confront it, it does not transgress it. It proposes the homosexual category as a regression to gender. Gayness coins its emancipation in the shadow of 'victorious capitalism.' (...) A hypocritical circuit that takes off its shoes to configure another orbit around power."[8]
For me, a maricón is when one—and I think that it is like a, a big fire belt that we wear all of us at given moments of our lives, people that identify as gay ... I think that a maricón is when we take out the swords and the spears, with the resplendent shine, and we are in a super kingdom, where there we are in control, truthfully, where we don’t take nothing from nobody, where we are up front, with all our contradictions but we are in a space where suddenly we attain a strength, that we blemish as necessary in moment X or Y, and suddenly comes out like a beautiful carriage, extra strong, armored, and it’s there, and it is working ... And there are people that, well, we are maricones more often than others, and then are others that, we don’t know that we are, that they are maricones until the moment arrives and the situation demands that the mariconería emerges, and fights for you, and that it defends you, and that it celebrates you. Gay is a definition that I find a little more passive, tranquil, more, you know... a maricón is that, a "maricón"...[1]
In 2010, a Chilean government campaign against gender-based violence that used the slogan "Maricón es el que maltrata a una mujer" (English: "Maricón is he that beats a woman") caused international controversy, with some groups demanding that it be discontinued, while others, including the Movimiento de Integración y Liberación Homosexual—a Chilean gay and lesbian group—supporting the campaign.[2]
In 2018, during the organizational discussions for the 21st "Regional Meeting of Women, Lesbians, Travestis and Trans" (Spanish: Encuentro Regional de Mujeres, Lesbianas, Travestis y Trans; ERMLTT) in La Matanza, Argentina, controversy was raised about the proposal for the participation of maricas as feminities.[7]
In 2021, the Ministry of Culture of Argentina caused controversy after including marica as a self-identification option in an official form developed by activist Marlene Wayar.[9] In response, journalist Gustavo Pecoraro offered his view to Infobae:
I appreciate being able to label myself as marica because that is how I understand my identity. I am not a man, neither a homosexual nor a gay. Whatsmore, puto also identifies me. [...] There is a whole discussion in the gay scene that has to do with associating gay with, first, the definition of homosexual, which was like a very ‘medical’ definition. Later, many people, as a matter of activism, began to call themselves gay, and many others, including myself, at some point in our lives we began to take hold of that. For many, it is still an insult to be called maricón. There was a lesbian theorist, Monique Wittig, who wrote a very important book called Lesbians are not women, which led to many lesbians not considering themselves women, but lesbians. The same goes for the gay/homosexual/marica/puto theme. I am a marica because culturally I move in a different way than a man moves and, in addition, it has reference to how I relate, not only because of sexual orientation, but also how I form my chosen family, how are my social and cultural customs, etc.[9]
https://www.aletheia.fahce.unlp.edu.ar/article/download/ALEe025/12000?inline=1#fn3
See also edit
References edit
- ^ a b c d Vidal-Ortiz, Salvador (2011). ""Maricón," "Pájaro," and "Loca": Cuban and Puerto Rican Linguistic Practices, and Sexual Minority Participation, in U.S. Santería". Journal of Homosexuality. 58 (6–7): 901–918. Retrieved July 22, 2021.
- ^ a b c d e Cashman, Holly R. (2012). "Homophobic slurs and public apologies: The discursive struggle over fag/maricón in public discourse". Multilingua (31). De Gruyter: 55–81. ISSN 1613-3684. Retrieved July 22, 2021.
- ^ a b c d e f González, Víctor M. (July 2, 2021). "Orgullo LGTB: por qué los gais nos llamamos maricón entre nosotros (y por qué los heteros no pueden hacerlo)". GQ (in Spanish). Retrieved July 23, 2021.
- ^ "Marica" (in Spanish). Royal Spanish Academy. Retrieved July 26, 2021.
- ^ Cano, Tono (March 2014). "Miguel de Molina, el malagueño que no quiso volver" (in Spanish). secretOlivo. Retrieved July 23, 2021.
- ^ Casco Ruiz, Víctor (June 5, 2016). "Maricón, que suena a bóveda" (in Spanish). elDiario.es. Retrieved July 23, 2021.
- ^ a b Guevara, Joaquín; Rodríguez, Sergia Tomás (2019). "Debates en torno a la identidad marica". XIII Jornadas de Sociología (in Spanish). Facultad de Ciencias Sociales. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Retrieved July 23, 2021.
- ^ Lemebel, Pedro (1997). "Loco Afán". In Echeverría, I. (ed.). Poco Hombre (in Spanish). Santiago: Ediciones Universidad Diego Portales. pp. 165–168. ISBN 978-956-314-242-6.
- ^ a b Riggio, Pablo (January 21, 2021). "El Ministerio de Cultura incluyó "marica" entre las opciones para la orientación sexual en un formulario y generó debate" (in Spanish). Infobae. Retrieved July 21, 2021.
