Since the 1960s American and Western European gays have set the agenda for sexual liberation and defined its emergence. But homosexuality is a global phenomenon, and gay and lesbian cultures around the world do not always neatly fit Western paradigms. This book investigates the implied imposition of a heavily capitalistic, white, and generally male model on emerging nations and suggests alternative frameworks for describing sexuality. By combining postcolonial and queer theories, the contributors to this volume explore diverse manifestations of homosexuality in the emerging world and the equally diverse literary representations of gay and lesbian lifestyles in those countries.