“Out” in the Club: The Down Low, Hip-Hop, and the Architexture of Black Masculinity

This essay explores the relationship between black masculine performances, the club space, and men on the "down low” (DL). Some black men who have sex with other men, who dis-identify with normative descriptors of sexuality, refer to themselves as “men on the down low.” The assumption about DL men, in recent publications, is that they do not reside in identifiably gay or queer spaces. This essay examines “The Gate”—a gay black club in Chicago—as a space which allows DL men to negotiate their masculine ideals and queer desire, challenging the traditional closet-threshold paradigm.