LGBT communities, identities, and the politics of mobility : moving from visibility to recognition in contemporary urban landscapes

Gay villages materialize residential, commercial and organizational concentrations of LGBT - mostly gay male - communities. They manifest some, not all, forms of gay social, political and economic life, but have nonetheless become markers of gay visibility and associated identity politics in the post-Second World War era, given that they are integral in the downtown fabric of roomy cities of the Global North, garnering mainstream attention and participation(Florida, 2002; Collins, 2004a). Over the last decade LGBT and mainstream media, politicians and communities have voiced concern over the 'de-gaying' of some such villages (M. Brown, 2013). Transformations in urban sexual geographies in the Global North include mainstream incorporation of particular gay and lesbian subjects and households, and the coalescence of alternative neighbourhoods and locations mooring and supporting gay lesbian bisexual, trans (LGBT) and queer lives (Collins, 2004a; Ruting, 2008). Sexual and gender identity politics are also entwined with a politics of mobility, which has both physical and social dimensions (Nash and Gorman-Murray, 2014). This entails material, representational and behavioural transformations in mobile lives, interwoven with shifting identities, politics and practices.