Homosexuality
HOMOSEXUALITY. Sexual activity between persons of the same sex is known from many places far and near throughout history. Because the word homosexuality derives from the Greek homos, meaning "same," and not from the Latin homo, meaning "man," the term refers both to sex between males and sex between females, though in practice lesbianism is used to refer to sexual relations between females. The image of homosexuality has a special history in the social, medical, and religious discourse of Western culture. This image equates the sexual behavior, personal identity, and sociosexual orientation of a person, often under a negative rubric. Other cultures, however, do not make this equation. Thus to say that someone engages in homosexual activity is different from saying he or she is "homosexual." Moreover, since about the eleventh century CE homosexuality has been seen as antithetical to Western ideas of church, family, and state; this attitude generally reflects a traditional Judeo-Christian cosmology. Homosexual relations in religious contexts outside the Western tradition have a wider meaning.
It has been argued both that homosexuality is universal and, to the contrary, that it is culture-bound to certain societies or historical periods. Part of this controversy depends upon how homosexuality is defined.
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