Part of: Queer Inclusion and Exclusion II
Abstract:
Personal designations, including those for queer individuals, play a central role in identity and labelling discourses (cf., e.g., Motschenbacher 2026). Despite their social importance, research on this topic in German remains limited. A project—L, S, B, T, I, Q, A and /+? – Linguistic visibility of queer people—investigated abbreviated personal designations such as LSBT, LSBTQ, LGBTIQ. These multi-segmental initialisms have emerged as independent lexical units through abbreviation from longer expressions.
The aim of the project was to gain insights into the usage, expansion and meaning (reference) of these initialisms. For this purpose, a corpus was compiled using data from the DWDS (Digital Dictionary of the German Language). Supplementary data (e.g., initialisms, definitions) were gathered from queer associations, and organisations (e.g., Hirschfeld-Eddy-Foundation, SPDqueer), dictionaries, and glossaries (e.g., Duden, Queer Lexikon).
The corpus comprises 30,453 instances of initialisms in context, which have been annotated and analysed quantitatively and qualitatively. The evidence is spread across 169 different variants of initialisms. The initialisms were expanded 2,405 times into their full forms. The analysis considers not only explicit references but also indirect definitions and contextual meanings, highlighting how these initialisms function beyond segmental expansion.
The presentation will report key findings on: (a) frequencies of variants, (b) the usage of special characters (<+>, <>), (c) the distribution across different sub-corpora (e.g., various newspapers), (d) the number of segments, (e) the variation in the segments’ expansion (e.g., trans, transgender, etc.) and (f) referential and semantic dimensions of initialisms investigated. These findings are enriched by an ongoing survey study on knowledge, usage and meaning of LGBT-based initialisms.
In some cases, a semantic detachment between initialisms and their full forms can be observed, raising questions about their function in labelling and categorisation processes. The discussion at the end of the presentation will take up the implications for linguistic labelling, categorisation and daily usage—also in relation to the main theme of the conference—, engaging with current theoretical perspectives (cf., Motschenbacher 2026, Scheller-Boltz 2017).
Literature:
- Motschenbacher, H. 2026. Labeling theory in language and sexuality studies. Journal of Language and Sexuality. Online-first article, 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1075/jls.24029.mot
- Scheller-Boltz, D. 2017. LGBT? LGBTQ+? LGBTTQQFAGPBDSM? Or just: QUEER! Critical Remarks on an Acronym in Slavonic and Non-Slavonic Languages. In Handler, P., Kaindl, K., Wochele, H. (Ed.): Ceci n’est pas une festschrift. Texte zur Angewandten und Romanistischen Sprachwissenschaft für Martin Stegu. Berlin 2017, 279–291.
