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Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Radical Exposure
T2 - Religion, Masculinity, and Politics in the William Bengo’ Collyer Scandal
AU - Begiato, Joanne
AU - Brown, Michael
PY - 2024/8/27
Y1 - 2024/8/27
N2 - This article considers a hitherto neglected sexual scandal involving the Congregational minister William Bengo’ Collyer and two young men at a public swimming baths in Camberwell (then in Surrey) in the spring of 1823. It explores the relationships between Congregationalism, and Evangelical Dissent more generally, and the cultures of contemporary masculinity and political radicalism. In so doing, it reveals how radical political figures, notably Thomas Wakley, constructed a masculine identity as upright, honest, and rigidly heteronormative, and shows how this was counterposed to the imagined masculinity of their opponents, who were often figured as effeminised, secretive, and sexually non-normative. Central to this process of rhetorical opposition was an emphasis on openness and public accountability, and this article demonstrates how the scandal that enveloped Collyer in the summer and early autumn of 1823 was framed by concerns over what should be secret, hidden, or exposed and what implications this had for contested notions of the public good.
AB - This article considers a hitherto neglected sexual scandal involving the Congregational minister William Bengo’ Collyer and two young men at a public swimming baths in Camberwell (then in Surrey) in the spring of 1823. It explores the relationships between Congregationalism, and Evangelical Dissent more generally, and the cultures of contemporary masculinity and political radicalism. In so doing, it reveals how radical political figures, notably Thomas Wakley, constructed a masculine identity as upright, honest, and rigidly heteronormative, and shows how this was counterposed to the imagined masculinity of their opponents, who were often figured as effeminised, secretive, and sexually non-normative. Central to this process of rhetorical opposition was an emphasis on openness and public accountability, and this article demonstrates how the scandal that enveloped Collyer in the summer and early autumn of 1823 was framed by concerns over what should be secret, hidden, or exposed and what implications this had for contested notions of the public good.
KW - Congregationalism
KW - masculinity
KW - politics
KW - radicalism
KW - religion
KW - sexuality
U2 - 10.1080/01916599.2024.2396237
DO - 10.1080/01916599.2024.2396237
M3 - Journal article
JO - History of European Ideas
JF - History of European Ideas
SN - 0191-6599
ER -