The Bear Book: Readings in the History and Evolution of a Gay Male Subculture

By Les Wright and John P. De Cecco

The Bear Book is a composite portrait of gay bears--usually big, hairy men who favor full-face beards and prefer to wear jeans and flannel shirts. This emergent social phenomenon and new sexual iconography is burgeoning across America, Western Europe, and other parts of the gay global village. The first-ever book on the gay bear phenomenon, this book offers readers a collection of first-person observations and historical and critical investigations by participant observers within and outside the bear community. This exciting book is organized in an ideologically revealing manner, including sections on history, identity, social spaces, iconography, and the bear phenomenon abroad. Because of the dialectical position of this work, it inevitably both describes and, to a lesser extent, may prescribe various parameters of this subculture-in-the-making.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1560238909
• ISBN13: 9781560238904
• Release Date: June 1997
• Publisher: Routledge
• Length: 308 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

If you're curious, buy it.

Good book for those in cultural studies, or someone curious about this subculture.

Dr. Bear..paging Dr. Bear...

While this book is heavy on history, it also reads like a college textbook into the history, culture, health and psychological aspect of the gay men who identify as "bears". Some of the chapters dragged, especially the ones dealing with the early 90's and the chat rooms and drama...but the ones that touched me were the personal coming out stories, and the men coming to terms with their bodies and attitudes in conservative America. Definatly a book that will stay on my shelf for many years to come.

Today's lecture...

For those interested in gay history and subculture, this is an invaluable book. This book provides a thorough reading of the anti-stereotypical gay male, but sometimes borders on over-analyzation..

the differences in bear & gay cultures

the bear book. This book has provided info into the bear world, futhermore bears are different from the gay culture the image that bears have are hairy bearded and usually heavy in my thoughts. i think of a bear as a hairy heavy bearded man!! very natural and very simple too. The straight culture accepts bears as a burly type men who dont think as gay..

a good if slightly biased look at this gay male culture

I myself am classified as a cub. I found this to be a very interesting and informative book on how the culture was thought to begin and why it also gave a good insite into the thought's behind it and other people i have let borrow this book have said that they like theway it was set out but there weren't enough personal experiances to make it more involving. I felt that the book was biased to the downfall of all bear clubs in australia exept the one in Brisbane. All in all a good read and informative on a historical sense. It is good to see an alternative to the usual boring historical books out there.