Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also campery, campiness, camping) flamboyance, overt exhibitionism; usu. but not invariably applied to homosexuals.

1874		Manchester Eve. News 22 Oct. 3/3: The ticket was handed up to the bench, and read as follows:– ‘Her Majesty, Queen of Camp, will hold a grand levé and grand ball masque on Wednesday, October 21st, 1874. Dancing to commence at ten o'clock; tickets 1s. 6d. each. Ices, refreshments, &c., will be provided’ .
1932		‘R. Scully’ Scarlet Pansy 150: They burlesqued all life. This they designated ‘camping’ and to ‘camp’ brilliantly fixed one’s social status. [Ibid.] 295: It was well nigh impossible to buy gifts, but they all rose to the occasion, stopping at the all night drugstores, picking up what they could, as Ella expressed to Kitty, ‘more for the camp of the thing than anything else’.
1945		E. Wilson 16 Jan. [synd. col.] ‘What’s a camp?’ [...] Anything that’s kinda [...] fun or chic or chichi or colorful’.
1947		(con. 1944) J.H. Burns Gallery (1948) 141: You and I both know what camping is.
1948		K. Williams Diaries 30 Jan. 21: Sid Field was marvellous [...] what camping! I simply roared!
1967		Oz 1 16/3: ‘Camp’ – the glorification of the inability to discriminate.
1970		T. Southern Blue Movie (1974) 213: ‘See if he’s got a hard-on’ [...] ‘Oh, I’d be delighted to,’ the other trilled in extreme camp.
1971		A. Buzo The Roy Murphy Show (1973) 131: The sort of quintessential contemporary high campery of the Antipodean mentality.
1972		E. Newton Mother Camp 36: A great deal of ‘camping’ goes on wherever gay people congregate at parties.
1979		J. Rechy Rushes (1981) 41: Sometimes he will even lunge into campiness, flirt with outlawed poses — limp wrist, thrust hip.
1988		(con. 1940s) C. Bram Hold Tight (1990) 193: A few queens roused themselves for a final round of camping.
1999		Observer Rev. 27 June 6: John Hannah, the comic brother, gets lost in the hamming and camping.
2000		Guardian Weekend 27 May 11: The group wore flamboyant costumes that brought together the previously unconnected fields of hip-hop and high camp.
2005		E. White My Lives 180: With me he couldn’t stop camping.

2. a homosexual male; a homosexual who takes themselves overly seriously.

1923		R. McAlmon Companion Volume 214: You only wanted six absinthes one after another [...] You old camp.
1963		J. Rechy City of Night 289: The butchest, straightest numbuh y’evuh laid yuh eyes on [...] Now look at him [...] a walkin camp if th’evuh was one!
1972		(con. 1965) E. Newton Mother Camp 110: A ‘camp’ herself is a queen [...] A camp is a flip person who has declared emotional freedom.
1972		B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular 41: camp 1. a. a fellow homosexual who is witty and well-liked ‘That camp keeps the measuring tape in the bedroom’ b. who is beginning to take himself too seriously ‘Oh, Henrietta, stop till such a camp!’ c. who is not funny or who is not even trying to be funny [...] 2. (Brit gay sl) effeminate male homosexual.
1980		Maledicta IV:2 (Winter) 242: Any Bette Davis movie is cherished by camps.
1999		G. Seal Lingo 116: Well established by the 1940s, the term camp to describe a homosexual is uniquely Lingo.

3. a gathering place for male homosexuals.

1935		A.J. Pollock Und. Speaks.
1942		Berrey & Van den Bark Amer. Thes. Sl.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 39/2: Camp [...] 4. The joint residence of a group of epicenes, ‘The wagon (police patrol) backs up to that camp every week for a load of nances (sodomists).’.

4. a flamboyant or effeminate person irrespective of their sexuality.

1949		‘Swasarnt Nerf’ et al. Gay Girl’s Guide 4: camp: [...] As a noun, one who puts it on thickly, e.g., ‘She’s such a camp.’ Also BCN [British Commonwealth of Nations] adjective equivalent to gay.
1959		J. Gielgud letter 12 Dec. in Mangan John Gielgud’s Letters (2004) 251: Carol Channing is rather a camp and quite a dear.
1999		G. Seal Lingo 116: camp is an effeminate man, not necessarily homosexual.