<Camp> Appropriating or Appropriated: Mae West in the 1930s and 1970s

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  • 〈流用〉する／される〈キャンプ〉
  • 〈流用〉する/される〈キャンプ〉--1930年代のメイ・ウェストと1970年代のメイ・ウェスト
  • リュウヨウ スル サレル キャンプ 1930ネンダイ ノ メイ ウェスト ト 1970ネンダイ ノ メイ ウェスト
  • ――一九三〇年代のメイ・ウェストと一九七〇年代のメイ・ウェスト

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<p>This paper examines the relation between Mae West and “camp” with reference to her biography and some films in which she stars. The examination focuses on the 1930s and 1970s, two significant periods for West's acting style; in the 1930s, she appropriates performing techniques from several unorthodox entertainers of the Belle Epoque—Bert Williams, Eva Tanguay and female impersonators—in order to establish her queer acting style (which was highly theatrical in its nature, and is later described as “camp”); but in the 1970s we see a cultural phenomenon in which her images are appropriated and commodified as an icon of camp in the field of pop culture, making a contrast with her active position in the 1930s when she appropriated other acting techniques for her style. Truly, her camp becomes a kind of “pastiche” appropriated by cultural industries in the 1970s, but this brings about a situation where her camp images circulate again in the cultural market, and this consequently saves her from oblivion. This way of regaining social visibility, though following the dominant cultural order, has potential for the strategic camp associated with “queer, or gay/lesbian, politics” in the 1990s.</p>

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