different between homosexuality vs brokeback

English

Etymology

From homosexual +? -ity or homo- +? sexuality

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -æl?ti

Noun

homosexuality (usually uncountable, plural homosexualities)

1. The state of being sexually attracted primarily or exclusively to persons of the same sex.
2. Sexual activity with a person of the same sex.

Usage notes

Homosexuality in women is also known as lesbianism. As homosexuality applies to people of either sex, the expression homosexuality and lesbianism is redundant and is best replaced by homosexuality or lesbianism alone as appropriate. Different cultural constructions of same-sex love are collectively referred to as homosexualities.

Synonyms

• gayness
• homosexualism
• lesbianism (applied only to women)
• uranism (obsolete)
• urningism (obsolete)

Antonyms

• heterosexuality
• straightness (slang)

Hypernyms

• queerness

Coordinate terms

• (sexual orientations) sexual orientation; asexual (-ity, ace), bisexual (-ity, bi), demisexual (-ity, demi), graysexual (-ity), heterosexual (-ity, straight), homosexual (-ity, gay, lesbian), omnisexual (-ity), pansexual (-ity, pan), plurisexual (-ity), polysexual (-ity), robosexual (-ity), sapiosexual (-ity), androsexual (-ity), gynesexual (-ity) ^{(Category: en:Sexual orientations)}

Related terms

• homosexual
• homoromanticism
• homoflexibility

Translations

See also

• LGBT, GLBT
• gay
• lesbian

English

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

break +? back; first used for "hunchback" in Carson McCullers' 1943 novella The Ballad of the Sad Café.

Adjective

brokeback (not comparable)

1. (rare) Hunchbacked.

   Damn those brokeback tramps making a mess of our city.

2. (rare) Broken; derelict.

   The brokeback bridges in the hills sadden me: this place used to be beautiful.

   • 2007, Charles Stross, Halting State (?ISBN), page 134:

     There will be underground rivers, vast and wide, and huge cavernous killing zones with mist-wreathed stalagmite islands and waterfalls thundering into the subterranean depths — and stepping-stones and brokeback bridges to traverse under ...

   • 2014, James W. Hall, The Big Finish: A Thorn Novel (?ISBN):

     As he drove Webb looked out at the brokeback houses, the ancient cars rusting in dirt driveways. At the ruined furniture in the weeds and ruptured refrigerators and stoves lying on their sides in the front yards. Disgraceful how they lived ...

Translations

Etymology 2

From the title of Annie Proulx's 1997 short story "Brokeback Mountain"; popularised by the 2005 film of the same name.

Adjective

brokeback (not comparable)

1. (slang, neologism) Homoerotic; homosexual, gay.

   I don't really think Frodo and Sam were gay, even if a couple of the scenes seemed a little brokeback to me.

Alternative forms

• Brokeback

Translations