ABSTRACT
Originally published in Klein, F. and Wolf, T. (eds) (1985) Two Lives to Lead: Bisexuality in Men and Women, New York: Harrington Park Press. Reproduced by permission of the author. This article was probably one of the first to consider what anglophone commentators call ‘bisexuality’ in a comparative cross-cultural context. Drawing on Blumstein and Schwartz’s research on bisexuality in the USA (see Chapter 7), Carrier’s findings suggest that the very notion of bisexual identity is specific to ‘Anglo-American’ contemporary culture. Carrier argues that, for Mexican men, the distinction between heterosexuality and homosexuality is not so much a matter of object choice-whether one’s sexual partner is male or female-as of the role one takes during intercourse-specifically, whether one is ‘active’ or ‘passive’. Carrier’s male respondents were able to engage in frequent sexual activity with other men as well as (or instead of) with women and yet still regard themselves as heterosexual as long as they always played the ‘active’ (i.e. insertive) role.
