Camp (style)

Camp is an aesthetic and sensibility that regards something as appealing or amusing because of its heightened level of artifice, affectation and exaggeration,[1][2][3] especially when there is also a playful or ironic element.[4][5] Camp is historically associated with LGBTQ+ culture and especially gay men.[2][6][7][8] Camp aesthetics disrupt modernist understandings of high art by inverting traditional aesthetic judgements of beauty, value, and taste, and inviting a different kind of aesthetic engagement.[6]

Camp art is distinct from but often confused with kitsch. The American writer Susan Sontag emphasized its key elements as embracing frivolity, excess and artifice.[9] Art historian David Carrier notes that, despite these qualities, it is also subversive and political.[10] Camp may be sophisticated,[11] but subjects deemed camp may also be perceived as being dated, offensive or in bad taste.[12][5] Camp may also be divided into high and low camp (i.e., camp arising from serious versus unserious matters), or alternatively into naive and deliberate camp (i.e., accidental versus intentional camp).[3][11][13][14] While author and academic Moe Meyer defines camp as a form of "queer parody",[7][8] journalist Jack Babuscio argues it is a specific "gay sensibility" which has often been "misused to signify the trivial, superficial and 'queer'".[15]

Camp, as a particular style or set of mannerisms, may serve as a marker of identity, such as in camp talk, which expresses a gay male identity.[16] This camp style is associated with incongruity or juxtaposition, theatricality, and humour,[17] and has appeared in film, cabaret, and pantomime.[18][19][20] Both high and low forms of culture may be camp,[3][21][8] but where high art incorporates beauty and value, camp often strives to be lively, audacious and dynamic.[6] Camp can also be tragic, sentimental and ironic, finding beauty or black comedy even in suffering.[18] The humour of camp, as well as its frivolity, may serve as a coping mechanism to deal with intolerance and marginalization in society.[5][22]

  1. ^ "Definition of CAMP". www.merriam-webster.com. 1 August 2024. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
  2. ^ a b "Definition of 'camp'". Collins Dictionary. HarperCollins Publishers. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
  3. ^ a b c "What does it mean to be camp?". www.bbc.com. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
  4. ^ "Camp, Adj., Sense 3." Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2023. https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/1024137863.
  5. ^ a b c "glbtq >> literature >> Camp". 8 February 2012. Archived from the original on 8 February 2012. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
  6. ^ a b c Kerry Malla (January 2005). Roderick McGillis (ed.). "Between a Frock and a Hard Place: Camp Aesthetics and Children's Culture". Canadian Review of American Studies. 35 (1): 1–3. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
  7. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference :2 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  8. ^ a b c Cite error: The named reference :3 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  9. ^ Harry Eiss (11 May 2016). The Joker. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. p. 26. ISBN 978-1-4438-9429-6.
  10. ^ Cite error: The named reference :20 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  11. ^ a b Sontag, Susan (15 February 2022) [1999], "Notes on 'Camp'", Camp: Queer Aesthetics and the Performing Subject: A Reader, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, p. 53, doi:10.1515/9781474465809-006, ISBN 978-1-4744-6580-9, retrieved 9 August 2024
  12. ^ Babuscio (1993, 20), Feil (2005, 478), Morrill (1994, 110), Shugart and Waggoner (2008, 33), and Van Leer (1995)
  13. ^ Harry Eiss (11 May 2016). The Joker. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. p. 11. ISBN [[Special:BookSources/%3Cbdi%3E978-1-4438-9429-6%3C%2Fbdi%3E |978-1-4438-9429-6]] Parameter error in {{ISBN}}: invalid character.
  14. ^ Dansky, Steven F. "On the persistence of camp." The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide 20, no. 2 (2013): 15-19.
  15. ^ Babuscio, J., 1999. The cinema of camp (aka camp and the gay sensibility). Camp: Queer aesthetics and the performing subject: A reader, pp.117-35.
  16. ^ Cite error: The named reference :17 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  17. ^ "glbtq >> literature >> Camp". 8 October 2011. Archived from the original on 8 October 2011. Retrieved 9 August 2024.
  18. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference :7 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  19. ^ Cite error: The named reference :18 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  20. ^ Cite error: The named reference CampWaters was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  21. ^ Baker, Paul (2004). Fantabulosa: a dictionary of Polari and gay slang. London: Continuum. p. 18. ISBN 978-0-8264-7343-1. OCLC 55587437.
  22. ^ Brett, Philip. "Queer Musical Orientalism". ECHO. University of California. Retrieved 9 August 2024.