Editing Cottaging (section)

{{Short description|Gay slang term}}{{See also|Gay beat}}[[File:public lavatorie-Pond Square-London.jpg|300px|thumb|The appearance of public lavatories, like this one in [[Pond Square]], [[Highgate]] ([[London Borough of Camden]]), is the origin of the term ''cottaging''.]] '''Cottaging''' is a [[LGBT slang|gay slang]] term, originating from the United Kingdom, referring to [[anonymous sex]] between men in a [[public lavatory]] (a "cottage"<ref>{{harv|Dalzell|Victor|2007|p=165}} "cottage ''noun'' a public lavatory used for homosexual encounters (UK)."</ref> or "tea-room"<ref name=Dalzell2007>Andre{{harv|Dalzell|Victor|2007|p=642}} "tearoom; t-room ''noun'' a [[Washroom|public toilet]]. From an era when a great deal of homosexual contact was in public toilets; probably an abbreviation of 'toilet room'.</ref>),<ref name=Mowlabocus2008/> or [[cruising for sex|cruising for sexual partners]] with the intention of having sex elsewhere.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=xJIe1E4myUMC ''Sex Tips for Gay Guys''] by Dan Anderson; Published by Macmillan, 2002; {{ISBN|0-312-28873-5}}, {{ISBN|978-0-312-28873-0}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Spies like us: His new thriller uses the latest DNA research and mobile phones as deadly weapons. So why look for inspiration in a Brompton cemetery? Henry Porter recalls a mix of luck, judgement and detective work 21 June 1999 |newspaper=The Guardian |url=https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/1999/jun/21/features11.g23 |quote=I watched from the corner of my eye and began to notice something else: the men seemed to be pairing off and dipping from view. Finally the penny dropped – I had hit cottaging hour among the moss-covered memorials to Kensington's long-dead bourgeoisie.}}</ref> The term has its roots in self-contained English toilet blocks resembling small [[cottage]]s in their appearance; in the English [[cant (language)|cant]] language of [[Polari]] this became a ''[[double entendre]]'' by [[gay men]] referring to sexual encounters.<ref name=fantabulous>[https://books.google.com/books?id=T72TJfZoywAC ''Fantabulosa: A Dictionary of Polari and Gay Slang''] by Paul Baker; Published by Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004; {{ISBN|0-8264-7343-1}}, {{ISBN|978-0-8264-7343-1}}.</ref>

The word "cottage", usually meaning a small, cosy, countryside home, is documented as having been in use during the [[Victorian era]] to refer to a public toilet and by the 1960s its use in this sense had become an exclusively homosexual slang term.<ref>{{citation|title=Passing English of the Victorian era|author=James Redding Ware|author-link=James Redding Ware|year=1909|publisher=EP |isbn=0-85409-932-8|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/passingenglishof0000ware}}</ref><ref>{{citation|title=A minority: a report on the life of the male homosexual in Great Britain|page=74|author=Michael George Schofield, Gordon Westwood|year=1960|quote=Most homosexuals regard 'cottaging' as very sordid and look down upon those who resort to this method of finding partners.}}</ref> This usage is predominantly British, though the term is occasionally used with the same meaning in other parts of the world.<ref>{{Cite book|year=1984|author=Maupin, A.|title=[[Babycakes]]|page=[https://archive.org/details/babycakes00maup_0/page/105 105]|publisher=Harper Collins |quote='I was busted for cottaging... You know..doin' it in a cottage... A cottage', Wilfred repeated. 'A public loo.'|isbn=0-06-092483-7}}</ref> Among gay men in the United States, lavatories used for this purpose are called ''tea rooms''.<ref>Rodgers, Bruce ''Gay Talk (The Queen’s Vernacular): A Dictionary of Gay Slang'' New York:1972 Parragon Books, an imprint of G.P. Putnam’s Sons Page 195.</ref><ref name=humphreys>In 1970, an American graduate student at [[Washington University in St. Louis]], [[Laud Humphreys]] published a famous and controversial PhD dissertation, ''Tearoom Trade: Impersonal Sex in Public Places'', on the tearoom phenomenon, attempting to categorize the diverse social backgrounds and personal motives. See {{harv|Humphreys|1975}}.</ref>