| Summary: | This dissertation examines the rituals and social interactions of African American men who use gospel music making as a means of worshiping God and performing gendered identities. I argue that these men wield and interweave a variety of multivalent sonic and visual cues, including vocal style, gesture, attire, and homiletics, to position themselves along a spectrum of gender identities. These multi-sensory enactments empower artists (i.e., "peculiar people") to demonstrate modes of "competence" that affirm their fitness to minister through speech and song. In biblical usage, peculiarity refers to those who are spiritually "set apart," "sanctified," or "consecrated" for God's purposes. While keeping alive this conventional meaning, I also use the term to index gender and sexual difference as articulated by African American men central to this project.
Through a progression of transcongregational case studies, I observe the ways in which African American men traverse tightly knit social networks to negotiate their identities through and beyond the worship experience. Coded and "read" as either "hyper-masculine," queer, or sexually ambiguous, peculiar gospel performances are often a locus of nuanced protest, facilitating a critique of heteronormative theology, while affording African American men opportunities for greater visibility and access leadership. This project thus examines the performative mechanisms through which black men acquire an aura of sexual ambiguity, exhibit an ostensible absence of sexual preference, and thereby gain social and ritual prestige in gospel music circles. By attending to the needs of fellow artists, clergy, and/or congregations, musicians also gain the discretion of those in positions of power who derive pleasure from their musical services and help to enforce a don't ask, don't tell arrangement. Same-sex relationships among men constitute an open secret that is carefully guarded by those who elect to remain silent in the face of traditional theology, but musically performed by those compelled to worship "in Spirit and in truth." Many African American gospel fans infer a connection between a musician's gendered performance and a "lifestyle" assumed to lie outside the boundaries of traditional Christian morality.
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