Not Just a Gay-Date App. Meanings and Appropriations of Grindr Among Argentinean Gay Men

MARENTES, MAXIMILIANO

Bremen

Congreso; German Anthropological Association (DGSKA) Conference 2021; 2021

German Anthropological Association (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Sozial- und Kulturanthropologie)

Among Argentinean gay men, dating app Grindr is experienced as a sign of hypersexualization. In this communication I analyze how these guys appropriate this app, and the meaning they give to it. First, it could be seen as a gate of homosocialization that produces sexual encounters, friendship and re-encounters with former partenaires. Second, it is referred as a market that introduces its own code and grammar in erotic-affective bonds. Third, opposed to love and monogamy, it could mean infidelity and a device for non-monogamous arrangements. Fourth, it is situated in the interaction between other flirting technologies. Fifth, it defines a category of partenaires known as the grindrs. Based on qualitative interviews with 30 Argentinean gay men, I propose that local appropriations of this globalized dating app allow to understand the way is strained in specific contexts. In doing so, I try to illustrate how, despite their criticism against this app, these guys continue to use it. To comprehend this paradoxical situation, we must connect the uses of Grindr to a local way of flirting: histeriqueo.