ABSTRACT
This work explored the relationship between music and gay identity in Cuba since the onset of the Special Period. Stokes wrote that music “provides means by which people recognize identities and places, and the boundaries which separate them” (1994). My research mission was to find out if and how this happens in the Cuban gay ambiente, and furthermore to uncover and analyze the mental, physical, and spiritual space that music provided for gays within the restrictions, paradoxes, and challenges of Cuba’s Special Period.
