Disidentifying Masculinities: Queer Latinx Embodiment in Australia

Latinx men are often associated with ‘machismo’, or dominant, aggressive forms of 

masculinity. This type of masculinity is also attached to stereotypes like the ‘Latin lover’ that 

typically frame Latinx men as excess in relation to white men. The aim of this paper is to 

discuss how young queer Latinx men living in Australia negotiate, embody, and complicate 

these existing dominant and racialised discourses. Queer, feminist and critical race theories 

are used to explore how queer Latinx men negotiate and embody masculinities, sexualities, 

and being ‘other’ in a white dominant cultural context. These tensions were explored through 

semi-structured in-depth interviews and a creative visual method known as sandboxing with 

twenty-one queer Latinx men. This method aims to elicit conversation and allows for 

reflection and sharing of a visual and symbolic representation of participants’ lives. 

Furthermore, it allowed for further exploration of topics that surfaced in semi-structured 

interviews. Findings suggest queer Latinx men understand masculinities beyond normative 

gender binary norms. The fluidity of masculinities surfaces in participants’ reflexive 

engagement with masculinities and their nuanced understandings of negotiating binary 

norms. To make sense of these negotiations I introduce the concept ‘feminine threshold’, a 

theoretical contribution in understanding how queer Latinx men negotiate masculinities. 

Bio

Adriana Haro has recently completed her PhD in Sociology and Anthropology at the University 

of Newcastle. Her PhD research explores how masculinities are embodied and negotiated by 

queer Latinx men in Australia. As a Global Voices Scholar she has been able to continue 

pursuing her passion for gender equality especially in working towards addressing sexual 

violence in higher education here at UON. She is also a causal academic and research 

assistant with the Newcastle Youth Studies Centre.