Camp (style)

"Campy" redirects here. For other uses, see Campy (disambiguation).

Camp is an aesthetic style 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.