| Summary: | M.A. === At about the same time as Gayspeak was developing across the Atlantic, 'coloured' and white South African gay men were also starting to use their own in-group form of communication. It became known as Gayle, a name which derives from the lexical item Gail, which means 'chat' in the language. This study will endeavour to classify the type of language variety of Gayle, as it clearly is not a separate language on its own. It will also examine why South African gay men have used, and continue to use Gayle in their everyday lives. Given what we said earlier about legitimising Gayle as an incontestable reality within serious linguistic study, and the dearth of serious research in this area, it is important that this topic take its rightful place in the field of sociolinguistics. As language is an integral part of culture, it is also important that a comprehensive lexicon of Gayle be compiled, in line with Joustra's Homo-erotisch Woordenboek, Courouve's Vocabu/aire de l'Homosexualite Masculine and Rodgers' Gay Talk: A (sometimes Outrageous) Dictionary of Gay Slang, as Gayle is an undeniable component in the history of South African culture. In the course of the empirical research component of this study, approximately 90% of respondents indicated an interest in, and need for, such a dictionary.
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