When i say "girlcrush"? I tend to mean it sexually.

[hermionesviolin]

"Women my age are more likely to say 'I adore' or 'I value' my women friends,' not girl crush," she said.

I feel like that's not necessarily because of residual worries about homo-whateverness but rather because it's bloody well more accurate -- plus it feels less like teenager language.

Using "crush" for anything non-sexual worries me.  Insert lengthy discussion of sexualization-on-LJ here.  (I'm all about intentionality, consistency, and honesty.  You can *hug* and *cuddle* me, and you can lust after my squishy brain, and depending on who you are *smooches* might be interpreted appropriately nonsexually, but if you're gonna *grope* you better mean it.  There's also the fact that i have enough difficulty reading signals in meatspace; stripped of so many additional clues in textual format i'm really gonna be grasping for honesty.)

Edit: Since it was an article from today's edition, i thought even the non-registered could read it. Am posting the full article under cut here:

The New York Times
August 11, 2005
She's So Cool, So Smart, So Beautiful: Must Be a Girl Crush
By STEPHANIE ROSENBLOOM

THE woman's long black hair whipped across her pale face as she danced to punk rock at the bar. She seemed to be the life of the party. Little did she know that she was igniting a girl crush. Susan Buice was watching, and she was smitten.

Ms. Buice, 26, and the dancer (actually a clothing designer) happen to live in the same Brooklyn apartment building, so Ms. Buice, a filmmaker, was later able to soak up many other aspects of her neighbor's gritty yet feminine style: her layered gold necklaces; her fitted jackets; her dark, oversize sunglasses; and her Christian Dior perfume.

"I'm immediately nervous around her," Ms Buice said. "I stammer around her, and it's definitely because I think she's supercool."

Ms. Buice, who lives with her boyfriend, calls her attraction a girl crush, a phrase that many women in their 20's and 30's use in conversation, post on blogs and read in magazines. It refers to that fervent infatuation that one heterosexual woman develops for another woman who may seem impossibly sophisticated, gifted, beautiful or accomplished. And while a girl crush is, by its informal definition, not sexual in nature, the feelings that it triggers - excitement, nervousness, a sense of novelty - are very much like those that accompany a new romance.

This is not a new phenomenon. Women, especially young women, have always had such feelings of adoration for each other. Social scientists suspect such emotions are part of women's nature, feelings that evolution may have favored because they helped women bond with one another and work cooperatively. What's new is the current generation's willingness to express their ardor frankly.

"Historically, talking about these kinds of feelings has gone in and out of fashion," said Paula J. Caplan, a sociologist who this fall will teach a course about the psychology of sex and gender at Harvard. Women have not been this blunt in expressing their crushes for several generations, Dr. Caplan said.

The phenomenon has been little studied, but some social scientists say they are glad that it is being discussed more, because it can be a window into how women mature emotionally.

"It's a little bit like when you're in elementary school and you first fall in love with someone," said Leslie Hunt, 34, who manages an arts internship program in New York and who once had such a potent crush on woman that she became sweaty in her presence.

Still, a crush is a relatively mild form of infatuation. People have killed themselves over true love, said Helen Fisher, an anthropologist at Rutgers University who has written extensively on human love. Think of Romeo and Juliet. With a girl crush, Dr. Fisher said, "you won't kill yourself if she doesn't want to jump rope with you." For that reason, girl crushes can give women safe and valuable experience in the emotions of love.

Dr. Fisher, the author of "Why We Love: The Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love," said girl crushes are as natural as any other kind of love. But they are romantic without being sexual. Love and lust are distinct urges, Dr. Fisher said.

This was one of the findings she and colleagues from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and the State University at Stony Brook made when they analyzed brain scans of people 18- to 26-years-old who were experiencing new love. Love and lust, it turned out, could be mapped to several separate parts of the brain.

"The brain system for romantic love is associated with intense energy, focused energy, obsessive things - a host of characteristics that you can feel not just toward a mating sweetheart," Dr. Fisher said, adding that "there's every reason to think that girls can fall in love with other girls without feeling sexual towards them, without the intention to marry them."

Wendy Lim, 26, a student at Harvard Business School, experienced such feelings about a year ago when she met another young woman in a Boston bar. The woman was open and outgoing, and when the evening was over, Ms. Lim very much wanted to talk to her again. "I remember at the end of the night wanting her phone number," Ms. Lim said, who felt awkward about asking. "I wouldn't ask a guy for his number."

As it turned out, the woman asked Ms. Lim for her number. The two saw each other again, and Ms. Lim's crush quickly blossomed into friendship, a friendship the women now cherish.

Crushes are typically fleeting, and infatuation often turns to friendship in this way. Lisa Lerer, a journalist, and Laila Hlass, a law student, both 25 and both of New York, started their friendship several years ago with a mutual crush. "We're still in love," Ms. Lerer said, "but the wooing period is over."

Tammea Tyler, 28, assistant director of child development services at the Y.M.C.A. of Greater New York, has a crush that looks as if it soon will make the change. The object of her infatuation is a colleague, Denise Zimmer, senior executive for government operation, who is 48.

Ms. Tyler said she admires Ms. Zimmer's intellect and her inner strength. "She really knows her stuff, and there's something almost sexy about that," Ms. Tyler said. "There's just something really sexy and powerful."

Ms. Zimmer, when a reporter told her about Ms. Tyler's feelings, said: "I was very surprised. Sometimes, when you don't have a direct relationship with someone, you don't really understand how they're observing you."

And while Ms. Zimmer did not say she had a reciprocal crush, she did say that she considers Ms. Tyler talented and grounded and that "it's exciting to work with someone who has shown that kind of interest." She added, "It's a mutual respect."

Once a crush is revealed, it can change the dynamics of a relationship. "I think that I will be more sensitive and more focused on sharing things with her that I think will help her achieve some of the goals that she has," Ms. Zimmer said.

Sometimes, though, a girl crush is so strong it makes the object of affection uneasy, killing the possibility of friendship.

Jane Weeks, 44, a freelance art and creative director in Truckee, Calif., knows what it is like to be the object of another woman's crush. She has encountered a few women who have eagerly adopted her tastes in food and interior design, her favorite colors, even her hairdresser. "At first it's flattering you're inspiring them," she said. "When they parrot back parts of yourself, it's extremely uncomfortable."

Ms. Weeks, an outdoorswoman who has hiked through the Andes from Argentina to Chile, said some women are more enamored with what she represents - "some National Geographic chick" - than with who she is. "When you're on a pedestal, there's no way but down," she said. "And it's lonely up there. You can't share your weaknesses."

Pepper Schwartz, a professor of sociology at the University of Washington and the relationship expert at PerfectMatch.com, said she also has been a frequent subject of girl crushes - from her students. Some have made it obvious by bringing gifts, including earrings, flowers and even poems. But Dr. Schwartz does not encourage her students to look at her with starry eyes. She would rather they look to her for guidance on developing their careers.

"You're a hero because they think you've done something unimaginably powerful," Dr. Schwartz said. "Your job is to show them that they own something equally special."

Perhaps the last time that young women were as willing as they are now to admit to their attraction to each other was in the 19th century. "Back when Louisa May Alcott was writing, women were writing these letters to each other," Dr. Caplan said. "They wrote: 'I miss you desperately. I long to hug you and talk to you all night.' " Referring to another woman as a girl crush, she said, is not dissimilar to that 19th century behavior.

But such impassioned expressions of affection were uncommon, for instance, in the 1960's and 70's, when homophobia was even more rampant than it is today, Dr. Caplan said. Women were often uncomfortable admitting to strong feelings for other women, fearing that their emotions would seem lesbian, she said. And those same women, older now, can still be shy about expressing their emotions for each other. "Women my age are more likely to say 'I adore' or 'I value' my women friends,' not girl crush," she said.

As for men, to the extent they may feel such emotions for each other, Dr. Caplan said they are less likely than women to express them. They are not reared to show their emotions. "A man talking about emotions about another man? Everybody's homophobic feelings are elicited by that, and that's because men aren't supposed to talk about feelings at all," Dr. Caplan said.

Susan Malsbury, 24, who lives in Brooklyn and is a booking agent for bands, said that because a girl crush has the potential to become an important part of one's life, she cannot help but feel a tinge of excitement whenever she meets a fascinating woman to add to her collection of crushes.

"They're better than boy crushes," Ms. Malsbury said, with more than a hint of mischief in her voice. "You don't have to break up with them after two weeks."

Comments

[ladyvivien.livejournal.com]

do you have the article? I'm not registered, so I can't see the whole thing.

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

I thought 'cause it was today's article non-registereds could still see. Pasted it into the entry.

[burnalive.livejournal.com]

It's interesting to read your take on word usage. I often find myself actively relishing stretching and bending the meanings of words to fit my needs and intentions.

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

:) Thanks.

Words are kind of hugely important to me (duh) and the tension between denotation and connotation, plus the invention of whole new terms and language usages, can be challenging.

I talked some more about this in response to the below comment if you're interested.

And i pasted the article into the entry if you're non-NYT-registered and wanna read the whole thing.

[trijinx.livejournal.com]

I've heard of a "man crush" (hetero male with non-sexual "crush" on another man), and that's always made some sense to me. "Girl crush," for some reason, doesn't gel in the same way.

I should also point out that I'm not a registered NYTer, so I'm commenting without having read the article.

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

Huh. I'm not sure i've heard the term "man crush" before. Neato.

I admittedly don't tend to use the noun "girl crush" very often. Usually it's "crush on [insert name here]." I'm more likely to use the term as a verb -- like "I've been seriously girl-crushing recently" which translates as lusting after every XX to cross my path. Basically "Wow i feel really gay lately." And this is turning into too much personal babble, huh?

I guess i can see using the term "girlcrush" for a nonsexual infatuation. It just seems weird to use a term with such sexual connotations for a nonsexual thing. Plus the use of "girl" implies something of an immaturity to it -- though partly that's a subset of the larger linguistic issue of having no good casual words for adult women, the female equivalent of "guy."

I thought because it was today's article the non-registered could still read, but since that was apparently a misconception i pasted the article into this entry.

[burnalive.livejournal.com]

I see what you mean about "girl" perhaps imparting a diminshing tone to the phrase, but I see the use of "girl" in this context as more serving to minimize the sexual/romantic nature of the word crush. Of course, this only applies to how I use/interpret the word - I can see how for others the phrase might be troublesome.

BTW, I was able to click in and read the article without signing in with my NYT id.

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

I see the use of "girl" in this context as more serving to minimize the sexual/romantic nature of the word crush.

Yeah, that's what a lot of people have been saying, and i'm beginning to come around to accepting that. I think my biggest problem is just the whole use of the term "crush" in a nonsexual context, 'cause it seems to unnecessarily confuse issues. Though admittedly English doesn't exactly have a lot of nonsexual words for intense admiration infatuation type things.

probably incoherent since it's 4 am but here's hoping

[sarrin.livejournal.com]

it seems to me like there's a vital assumption of heterosexuality implicit in using the term. I mean -- it shouldn't matter, because just because someone is attracted to members of a given sex, doesn't mean they're attracted to all members of that sex, even if they love/crush on them, but ... it still seems like the ambiguity of bisexuality demolishes the inherent non-sexuality of the term.

which doesn't really make much sense, except in the context of what you said. if someone's straighter than straight, then they can use "girl crush" all they want, and there's no signals crossed. if someone's bisexual or gay or ... whatever -- even if the term directly implies a non-sexual relationship (which is how I've always seen it used -- and how I've seen boycrush used, too) -- there's just this element of "wait? what did they mean?" that makes the term wonky and no longer quite as cute.

I tend not to use girlcrush, because I find it odd, but I think that's the Smith context. On the other hand, I love going around pointing out boycrushes. Because, hm, boycrushes are love.

I very much agree with your assessment of teenager language: I actually think it's something even younger than that. I harken it back to, like, pre-teen crushes, before there was Sex and Groping, when it was just Oh Gosh and Aren't They Cool? because that's a girl crush. So the language isn't demeaning or diminishing so much as appropriate.

Re: probably incoherent since it's 4 am but here's hoping

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

Yeah, i think the term is only workable when you absolutely know whether it's sexual or not, and having spent 4 years at Sexual Experimentation Central i hear a woman expressing interest in another woman and i immediately think, "Maybe she's queer" (inclusive of established queerness and also experimentation and self-discovery). I feel like "platonic crush" or something would be a better term. One of my very straight Smith friends frequently says, "I love you nonsexually." And on LJ i see a lot of squishy-brain-lust, where it's clear that people are infatuated with certain aspects of a person but that it doesn't necessarily (have to) translate into actual sexual desire for said person.

I was thinking about how odd it would be for a woman to talk about a "boycrush" -- because everyone expects women to crush on males, so i think part of what's bothering me is the negating of queerness. Or maybe "appropriating" it would be more accurate. 'Cause it does almost have this flavor of the "Some Girls (Dance With Women)" thing. I mean, it's not that, but just the whole straight-women-being-queer-except-not is frustrating. Like, can't we bring back words like "admire" instead of stretching sexual words to nonsexual definitions and making people even more confused?

Good point about the pre-sex-ness of girl-crush-y-ness -- though i'm sure there are plenty of women who would claim they had crush-type feelings for other females when they were pre-pubertal and would claim those as early indicators of their now-claimed queerness.

[wisdomeagle]

*has now read article*

Nonono! They* aren't allowed to take romantic friendship! It's ours. At least they didn't quote anyone more provocative than Louisa May Alcott.

Um, I would totally find usages like that really annoying, since the girlcrush as described herein was pretty much my first experience of being a sexualromantic type person? And I guess I tend to take it... sort of more literally than they are. I think it's my tendency to queer everything and the extra-canonical shippery tendency to sexualize everything, but ... like, all the really intense close female friendships I've had (at least in meatspace)? Have become explicitly sexual.

It does sort of bother me that romantic friendship has gone permanently out of vogue, but the concept of romantic friendship is so slippery to me, and I guess it's the "romantic without being sexual" thing, because I tend to think that things that are romantic but not sexual have some repressed sexuality going on.

And agree with what ppl said above about how this kind of language presupposes heterosexuality. Er. Non-queer space is so weird and confusing to me.

*mainstream hetlike people

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

Slash sometimes feels problematic to me because we take every close relationship (and lots of not-so-close relationships) and turn them sexual, like negating the idea that anyone could have a close nonsexual relationship. And then i think about i sexualize just about every close relationship i have, so perhaps it's not so out of the realm of possibility. Though then of course there's the fact that we make characters way more sexually active than is perhaps accurate.

And "romantic friendship" has always struck me as a strange concept. In part of course because i haven't done the research to really figure out what it means. Doing Queer Studies around the time i started doing fanfic, i remember the problematics of importing modern sensibilities into other sociohistorical periods -- of saying "of course they were queer" when not only did people's self-identifications differ, but things we read as sexual indicators might not actually have been as sexually as we see them.

I was thinking of how odd it would be for a woman to talk about a "boycrush" -- because everyone expects women to crush on males, so i think part of what's bothering me is the negating of queerness.

And i think i might talk about this more in my comment above to sarrin.

*loves on the discuss-y-ness*

[wisdomeagle]

like negating the idea that anyone could have a close nonsexual relationship.

This is something that is constantly frustrating to me about slash and about the discussions about it and about my RL. Because on the one hand, I do clearly see that the obsession with sex/romance as the most valid of all kinds of relationships is kind of frustrating and buys into "sex is more important than friendship" which isn't cool, but on the other hand, when we say, "why can't we write close friendships that AREN'T sexual?" I keep thinking, well, my very best friend in the world is my girlfriend. And she was my very best friend first.

I guess what bothers me is not so much the non-sexualness as the explicit non-sexualness. Saying, "I love her -- but not in a sexual way don't get me wrong!" instead of leaving it in the liminal, subtexty area. Explicitly sexualizing it doesn't bother me so much as explicitly non-sexualizing it.

And then i think about i sexualize just about every close relationship i have,

Yeah, me too.

Though then of course there's the fact that we make characters way more sexually active than is perhaps accurate.

That's why fictional people are so much cooler than real people (present company accepted. :P )

(snip) i remember the problematics of importing modern sensibilities into other sociohistorical periods -- of saying "of course they were queer" when not only did people's self-identifications differ, but things we read as sexual indicators might not actually have been as sexually as we see them.

To me embracing romantic friendship as queer isn't so much saying Emily Dickinson or Katherine Philips or Sor Juana, etc were anachronistically queer as embracing their experiences as part of my own symbolic vocabulary? When I was ~14 and read poems/letters/stories about romantic friendship in a lesbian anthology, I felt for the first time like these were actual people who felt like I did; the language of romantic friendship spoke to me much more strongly than more contemporary lesbian literature, probably because I was such a headcase with the authority figures, but that's neither here nor there.

I guess because of that experience with romantic friendship, it really bothers me when heterosexual women appropriate the concept to describe their own really close friendships, because I want it for *us* and to me it feels like the explicitly desexualizing of it isn't fair because I want those as a potentially sexual language for describing my experiences.

But on the other hand, when the lesbian community co-opts that kind of langauge, we're explicitly sexualizing it, which I suppose does the same thing to the straight community that wants the language to be potentially non-sexual.

And neither of course is entirely fair in terms of authorial intent, because the language is ambiguous and barring seance, we don't know and can't how [they] concepualized their relationships.

[hermionesviolin.livejournal.com]

I do clearly see that the obsession with sex/romance as the most valid of all kinds of relationships is kind of frustrating and buys into "sex is more important than friendship" which isn't cool, but on the other hand, when we say, "why can't we write close friendships that AREN'T sexual?" I keep thinking, well, my very best friend in the world is my girlfriend. And she was my very best friend first.

I don't think of my slashing of everything as saying that sexual/romantic relationships are of higher value than non-sexual relationships, but rather that they're more interesting. Though i guess in some ways that boils down to the same thing.


That's why fictional people are so much cooler than real people (present company accepted. :P )

:) The word you want is "excepted" (as in, an exception to a rule) but i'm okay with being accepted.


I guess because of that experience with romantic friendship, it really bothers me when heterosexual women appropriate the concept to describe their own really close friendships, because I want it for *us* and to me it feels like the explicitly desexualizing of it isn't fair because I want those as a potentially sexual language for describing my experiences.

I like the idea of a potentially sexual language for describing experiences -- and this makes some of what you said earlier in this same comment make more sense (which means i get to delete my vague disagreements).

And having encountered this whole "romantic friendship" thing only in passing in a Queer Studies class i mostly have no idea what i'm talking about in terms of what language it is that we're talking about and how it gets co-opt-ed. (Mostly what i was talking about was people reading histories, letters, etc. and saying, "Look, they were queer" and attempting to portray queerness as legitimate by pointing to examples throughout history.)