Humans have willingly stepped across societal and cultural norms for eons, hoping to achieve new forms of entertainment. One of those boundary-pushing instances emerged with the world of drag. Drag is a world within a world. Its tradition has been carried on for generations through entertainment and the arts, dating back to Shakespeare and beyond to Ancient Greece. In layman’s terms, drag could be described as the art of a man dressing as a woman for entertainment value. As this cultural phenomenon aged, so did it’s language. Drag speak could indefinitely have its own glossary filled with endless vocabulary words. Being familiar with this language means knowing the differences between busted and dusted, kiki and kai kai, and what it means to
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The mere idea of a man dressing up as a woman would have sounded completely absurd and could have drove most of these people into a state of upset and confusion. It was around the time I first watched Drag Race when I began both thinking for myself and shying away from the suppressive and oppressive local norms. As I shifted away from normality and deeper into myself, I soon found that I had nobody to share my newfound obsession with. At this point, I was still in the closet. I had not told anybody, not even my mother, that I was gay. I would never have the guts to go into school speak like a drag queen would. It would have probably resulted in me being hung by my underwear on the flagpole, given a swirlie, or something else to that dramatic high school extent. I began to engorge my social media accounts with drag news by following queens and joining fan groups. I do not consider myself a drag queen but I do consider myself a mere bystander to the phenomenon. I learned the language by examining drag queens and becoming infatuated with the culture. My transition into the community was rapid and my knowledge regarding the language of drag flourished. Learning this language brought me closer to my community and helped my overall sense of self …show more content…
Created by the queer community, the language brings a sense of togetherness. As I continued to watch drag race season-after-season, the drag terms I knew multiplied. Throwing shade is a subtle way of reading somebody. To read means to flawlessly insult without breaking a sweat. “What brand of makeup do you use? Sherwin-Williams?” To be fishy means to look very feminine and when a queens tuck is off, their penis may be visible or bulging through their clothes. Online, words are often misspelled to give more personality and meaning behind what is being said. Yaaas is an exclamation of the word yes, especially useful to shout repeatedly during a Lady Gaga performance or the equivalent. Work/werq/werk is something you would say to someone who is doing a good job. “Yaaaas, you bettah werk, b*tch.” Busted means looking messy while dusted means looking polished. Drag speak really spices up language. Instead of saying “your makeup is lovely,” you could say “girl, your mug is beat for the gods.” All of these terms and many more make up the language of drag and together they could fill a glossary. This language helped me, an LGBT outsider, become more familiar with my community through entertainment. I felt more connected and soon became in tune with my gay-self as much as I possibly could while living in a backwater town. I wanted to know more. I needed to dive deeper into the world by knowing
The mere idea of a man dressing up as a woman would have sounded completely absurd and could have drove most of these people into a state of upset and confusion. It was around the time I first watched Drag Race when I began both thinking for myself and shying away from the suppressive and oppressive local norms. As I shifted away from normality and deeper into myself, I soon found that I had nobody to share my newfound obsession with. At this point, I was still in the closet. I had not told anybody, not even my mother, that I was gay. I would never have the guts to go into school speak like a drag queen would. It would have probably resulted in me being hung by my underwear on the flagpole, given a swirlie, or something else to that dramatic high school extent. I began to engorge my social media accounts with drag news by following queens and joining fan groups. I do not consider myself a drag queen but I do consider myself a mere bystander to the phenomenon. I learned the language by examining drag queens and becoming infatuated with the culture. My transition into the community was rapid and my knowledge regarding the language of drag flourished. Learning this language brought me closer to my community and helped my overall sense of self …show more content…
Created by the queer community, the language brings a sense of togetherness. As I continued to watch drag race season-after-season, the drag terms I knew multiplied. Throwing shade is a subtle way of reading somebody. To read means to flawlessly insult without breaking a sweat. “What brand of makeup do you use? Sherwin-Williams?” To be fishy means to look very feminine and when a queens tuck is off, their penis may be visible or bulging through their clothes. Online, words are often misspelled to give more personality and meaning behind what is being said. Yaaas is an exclamation of the word yes, especially useful to shout repeatedly during a Lady Gaga performance or the equivalent. Work/werq/werk is something you would say to someone who is doing a good job. “Yaaaas, you bettah werk, b*tch.” Busted means looking messy while dusted means looking polished. Drag speak really spices up language. Instead of saying “your makeup is lovely,” you could say “girl, your mug is beat for the gods.” All of these terms and many more make up the language of drag and together they could fill a glossary. This language helped me, an LGBT outsider, become more familiar with my community through entertainment. I felt more connected and soon became in tune with my gay-self as much as I possibly could while living in a backwater town. I wanted to know more. I needed to dive deeper into the world by knowing