The butch-femme couple has been a part of the American lesbian community for over a century. At times they have won the ability to be a public presence, at others they have been forced underground by both straight and lesbian politics. Throughout this time, butch-femme couples have come under fire from all sides. Dominant culture tells butch-femme couples that they are an anomaly; one partner too lesbian to be acceptable, one not enough to be recognized. Even within the lesbian community, there is little understanding of the construction, dynamics or nature of butch-femme relationships.

Lesbian feminist politics of the 60's and 70's viewed the seemingly unequal power dynamic of butch-femme relationships to be a mirror of heterosexual oppression. This forced the "disappearance" of butch-femme from visibility for over two decades. By the 90's in the United States, the concept of fluid gender has become a more easily contemplated notion. Assisted by a growing body of lesbian literature, including powerful work by writers such as Pat Califia, Leslie Feinberg, and Joan Nestle, conventional notions of gender, sexual identity and power are being turned inside out. Butch-femme is experiencing resurgence into acceptance by the lesbian community. It is also filtering into dominant American society, as a recent cover of Newsweek depicting Cindy Crawford shaving K.D. Lang suggests.

As Judith Roof stated in her essay "1970's Lesbian Feminism Meets 1990s Butch-Femme", "By the 1990s, butch-femme is back, this time as a political possibility". (Roof 27)

Heterosexism is an ideological and institutional domination of heterosexuality. In the United States, the majority of literature, images from movies and the media promote an assumed, privileged heterosexuality.

Lesbian literature challenges compulsory heterosexuality, partially through its very existence and portrayal of a wide range of lesbian experience. In her essay "Persecution and Resistance", Monika Reinfelder suggests that the most treacherous way that lesbians are oppressed is through the denial of their existence: "Our invisibility is part of, and compounds, the heterosexism we are constantly subjected to. Be it on an individual or institutional level. It is, in fact, so powerful that we ourselves often believe we do not exist. Even in the more liberal countries, teenagers often grow up believing they are the only ones who have these feelings". (Reinfelder 11)

In order to ensure the Lesbian Feminist Movement's inclusion within the Women's Movement of the 60's and 70's, it had to subscribe to certain connections wrong sex, gender and oppression. These used the gender of the participants to define the nature of sexual practice. "Sex between a man and a woman could only enact an oppressive situation, while sex between two women necessarily tapped into such positive womanist traits as gentleness, warmth, kindness, equality, decenteredness, non-goal-orientation, and a total absence of dominant/submissive formations." (Roof 28)

This method of "deconstructing the power relations inherent in constructions of identity" (Goodloe 1) makes it possible to construct a counter-ideology with the goal of liberating marginalized groups.

Unfortunately, that type of deconstruction also leads to new types of oppression using different boundaries. In the US Lesbian Feminist Movement, Butch-Femme couples found themselves outside of these new boundaries. They did not conform to the roles or styles of dominant society. In addition, the movement, which sought to liberate lesbians, marginalized those inhabiting butch-femme roles because they did not adhere to the "lesbian ideal".

In the 40's and 50's, butch identity was one of the only visibly queer expressions. It was also a way to introduce "overt sexuality into women's relationships with each other". (Kennedy, Davis 63). It evolved as a complex dance of external style signals, shifting gender roles and expression of female desire.

By the 90's, butch-femme couples remain one of the more visible aspects of lesbian culture. Also attached to that visibility are negative biases from both the lesbian and straight communities.

The fixed gender and sexual expression of the heterosexist lens do not easily resolve butch-femme dynamics. It assumes that a woman exhibiting what dominant culture dictates as "masculine" traits must want to be a man. It also assumes that a femme woman who desires butch women is really trying to act out a heterosexual model. In this way, femmes are again reduced to unrecognized status. Pat Califia's "The Femme Poem" captures much of the pain inflicted upon butches by heterosexism, as well as challenging the assumption that femme desire is really a misguided desire for men:

"Being a successful femme means making a butch desire you and then enduring when that lust turns into suspicion. "If you want me," she sneers, "You must really want a man." Nobody knows how much it hurts when you go out in the street and straight men tell you the same damned thing. But what I want is you, a woman. All of you. The muscles in your forearms and thighs when you hold yourself over me". (Califia 415) at Califia's "The Femme Poem" captures much of the pain inflicted upon butches by heterosexism, as well as challenging the assumption that femme desire is really a misguided desire for men. "The Femme Poem" also challenges the biases of the lesbian community, suggesting a relationship that does include both masculine and feminine roles but is not oppressive to either participant. Califia's piece contrasts strongly with Malu Marin's essay, "Stolen Strands: The In and Out Lives of Lesbians in the Philippines", which states: "There is fierce resistance even among lesbians to call or label themselves as 'lesbian'... Interestingly, women in butch/femme relationships vary in their self-identification: butches would consider themselves men, and femme-players do not, for most of the time, call themselves lesbian." (Marin 37) Marin's essay goes on to say that in the Philippines, the domination of a heterosexist model is so strong that women can rarely conceive of a gender identity outside of it. The differences between these portrayals of lesbian subjectivity in the United States and in the Philippines suggests a correlation between the availability of alternative images of gender and sexual identity, and the variety of forms that lesbian identity takes within that culture. This includes the many different dynamics contained within the category of "butch-femme" which have primarily had an opportunity to develop in the United States, Canada and Western Europe.

In attempting to classify butch-femme, the complexity of the issue becomes apparent. What is too femme to be butch, or too butch to be femme? In order to belong to one classification, does an individual have to characterize all of (and only!) the traits considered "masculine" or "feminine"? In the US in the 90's, though acceptance of "alternative" sexualities is growing, sexuality is still generally perceived as fixed. Classifying certain gender expressions as "butch" or "femme" subverts conventional notions of gender and its relation to sexuality. It is also a way for women to identify others who inhabit similar gender spaces as they do; it is certainly easier to draw people together when there is a name to identify their common element. The designation of "butch-femme", holds both power and the ability of being used against those it identifies. When viewed through the heterosexist lens, it can be construed as a gender dichotomy with little movement in between, or two elements that are dependent on each other to exist. Women in butch-femme communities across the United States and Canada exhibit a great diversity in their gender expressions. "If you put four self-identified femmes in a row, you may find it hard to determine what they are supposed to have in common. Watch your perplexity grow as your gaze jumps back and forth from one woman's red pumps to another's gym shoes, and from each individual woman to representations of "the" femme." (Weston 4) It is overly simplistic and reductive to say that all heterosexual women are domestic, nurturing, sensitive and play a more passive role in bed, just as it would be to say that all heterosexual men are strong, stoic and sexually aggressive. Applying the same constraints to butches or femmes is even more reductive. Viewing self-identified butches and femmes as little more than role-players ignores the enormous variety with which they "play" those roles. As Roof suggests, "if a homogenous gender can be characterized by so many differences, then certainly those differences can be characterized by gender and sexual difference." (Roof 33) Butch and Femme create a powerful and complex dynamic when paired with each other, but are not dependent on each other in their construction. "My core femme gender, who I am, how I exist in the world, is mine. It is not dependent on being with a Butch. What makes me Femme is wholly about how I construct my femininity, how I exist in the power of my femaleness, how I am so devoutly Queer, and my deep connections to the women from generations past in my family who helped raise and nurture me." (Chris)

There is ambiguity surrounding the pronouns butches and femmes use to identify themselves. There are only three choices of pronoun in the English language; "he" denotes male sex and masculine gender expression, "she" denotes female sex and feminine gender expression, "it" denotes asexual sex, neuter gender expression. Within such a restrictive classification system, how do you address an individual of female sex with masculine gender expression? For many butches, "she" is representative of the qualities they adore in femmes, but does not feel suitable for themselves. Their adoption of "he" is not necessarily used as a recognition of themselves as male, but as different from the gender expression "femme". "This is not a man passing on the street who sees you as a man, arm in arm with me, a woman. This is not a lesbian who watches us dancing at a party, and sees you as either a butch lesbian or a woman trying to be a man, and me as femme or deluded. This is someone who lives in a world where gender and sex are fluid. Not an academic exercise, but what she tells the kids about who she is as their father. The shock to me of you sitting here as him, at this ordinary formica table, though of course that is the pronoun that suits your masculine spirit, short hair, oxford shirt, men's slacks. The word spoken about you not in hostility or misperception, but because, for you both, that is how flexible gender is." (Pratt 292) In her story "Lunch", Minnie Bruce Pratt eloquently explores some of the difficulties encountered when the gender expression at the core of an individual's identity does not line up with the fixed polarity of the heterosexist world. The narrator speaks of her lover's attempt to get a driver's license that indicated "male" to match her looks, simply to avoid prejudice. "Lunch" challenges the institutional system that requires one to be either "male" or "female", and suggests an alternative to the assumed connection between "masculine, feminine, and who does certain work in our home." (Pratt 294).

The ambiguity present in conceptualizing butch-femme identities is complicated significantly by broadening the scope to include other countries. When representations of butch-femme subjectivity around the world are taken into consideration, it is apparent that social and cultural factors play a large role in how butch-femme is constructed and viewed by mainstream society. The degree to which women can move between, and within, classifications of gender roles depends greatly on influences from mainstream media, feminist movements and how long the community has existed. In the United States, Canada and several other countries, the stereotypes of lesbianism are linked irrefutably with traits recognized as "butch". By being too butch, a lesbian is considered to be crossing a boundary and is treated as though she were offensive. This leads to femme invisibility and pressure for many lesbians to fit into the "sea of androgynous anonymity." (Lynne) This tension is also evident in "Out On Main Street", Shani Mootoo's story of a Caribbean-Canadian butch-femme couple's outing to a restaurant in downtown Vancouver. "Walking next to Janet, who se femme dat she redundant, tend to make me look like a gender dey forget to classify." (Mootoo 171) The narrator feels targeted when she is with her partner, as though when situated beside a femme, her butchness, and therefore their lesbianism, becomes "too" apparent. "I tell she I don't know why she don't cut off all dat long hair, and stop wearing lipstick and eyeliner. Well, who tell me to say dat! She get real vex and say dat nobody will tell she how to dress and how not to dress, not me and not any man". (Mootoo 176) Social and cultural climate has an effect on how butch-femme is perceived in other countries as well. In "Queering the State: Towards a Lesbian Movement in Malaysia", Rais Nur writes how the lesbian feminist movement of the west has not been carried through to Malaysia. She states that "without feminism's insight on how patriarchy works to oppress women and how gender roles function to reinforce patriarchal power, many lesbians simply adopt heterosexual notions of gender and replicate heterosexual relationships without questioning them". (Nur 75) Without access to other models, lesbians in Malaysia generally view butch-femme as the only possible dynamic. In Tina Machida's "Sisters of Mercy", she examines lesbianism in Zimbabwe. Social and cultural forces are strongly traditional and view lesbianism as a punishable offense. Butch lesbians are sometimes said to be inhabited by a "male spirit", and after going through certain rituals can marry other women. In this way, lesbians can openly love other women, but only by adopting a heterosexual paradigm. The social climate in Zimbabwe currently does not offer any alternatives. In this instance, conforming to traditional gender roles is considered more important than conforming to traditional (heterosexual) sexuality.

Drag Kings are a unique aspect of the lesbian community taken from a long tradition dating back to the Burlesque and Vaudeville era. Butches in New York in the 40's would dress as men and perform in drag. Differing from transgendered individuals, cross-dressers or male impersonators, Drag Kings are "often a parody of today's masculine culture from a lesbian's view point". (Waters) Today many Drag Kings employ elements of "camp" in their performance, meant to entertain or educate.They consider their personas more parodies of men than attempts to be them. Drag Kings are another part of the lesbian community that challenge gender assumptions. There has recently been an explosion in the popularity of Drag King shows, extending to a mainstream audience in some American cities. Lesbians in the west do have alternatives to a heterosexual model. The visible existence, and current resurgence, of butch-femme suggests that beneath the affects of socialization, there lies an inherent attraction to certain gender expressions. In Susan Moon's "The Tomboy Returns", the narrator is a straight woman who explores her feelings towards gender. She writes, "Though I couldn't have stated it consciously, I breathed in the knowledge that a woman's body was not a powerful place to live... I didn't try to pretend I was a boy, I just wanted to be ungendered, and therefore unlimited."

The narrator's observations of women and their limited power in society mirror the thoughts of many young women. Women inhabiting butch or femme "roles" take back some of the power of being women. Butch-femme couples not only reconstruct power dynamics to empower both partners, but also link lesbianism back to sex and constructions of desire. "When you deny that roles, S/M, fantasy, or any sexual differences exist in the first place, you can only come up with neutered sexuality, where everybody's got to be basically the same because anything different puts the element of power and deviation in there and threatens the whole picture." (Hollibaugh, Moraga 244) Lesbian feminism built walls surrounding gender and sexuality that took their plan from heterosexism. Butch-femme offers an alternative to an egalitarian system; a power structure that is entered into voluntarily which shifts according to the participants' wishes. Butch-femme creates a structure within which it is possible for a woman to be powerful, vulnerable, or perhaps both at the same time. An important part of the butch-femme dynamic is desire. "I am butch because I express desire for a woman in terms of how I can make her feel." (Hyde 454) "Being femme for me is about softness of my body, the strength of my bones... it is the queerness of my desire, the need of my soul, the ache in my heart, the power in my cunt, it is not a choice, it is my life". (Chris) "When the boys taunted you with, 'You throw like a girl!', and so you slammed the ball into the boy's mitt so hard, he hadda take his hand out and shake it... was your 8 year-old heart screaming, 'I don't throw like no GIRL!'... or... 'There's nothing wrong with the way girls throw!'". (Rhon)

Butch-femme throws the same hardball to both the straight and lesbian communities. In the 90's, it sends a message that each example of the amazing variety with which lesbians express their gender and sexuality is perfectly acceptable, and that they should be free to do so in any way they choose.