ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that gay men's friendships can perform a variety of roles, which can be broadly understood twofold: as sources of support and as relational contexts for constructing new senses of identity and relating to others. In discussing the roles played by friendships in LGBT people's lives, we need to be aware of the practicalities of why friendships are formed in particular contexts and at specific moments in time. In other words, friendships have often been developed out of necessity, for negotiating the heteronormativity of everyday life. The chapter reviews the work of Giddens and others who suggest that LGBT people have become exceptionally skilled in the art of forming intimate relationships based on equality, mutuality and acceptance. It discusses why organisations are important sites for investigating gay men's friendships, and why there is a general tendency among organisation studies scholars to understand workplace friendships as a bottom-line concern.
