Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons^™

Lgbtqc: Queer Perspectives On The Illinois-Iowa Quad Cities, Robert Burke

Anthropology: Student Scholarship & Creative Works

Cities are broadly conceived to be queer utopia when compared with rural spaces. While the Quad Cities of Illinois and Iowa fit this simplistic model in some ways, the region has several unique characteristics that warrant their own investigation. I argue that the social climate of the Quad Cities is generally perceived as welcoming and inclusive by the LGBTQ+ community. However, despite an assortment of community-building institutions, some find socialization and partner-seeking a bit difficult. Many advocate for investment in a variety of physical LGBTQ+ “third places” (public gathering places), which would yield a variety of benefits for this community. …

Asexuality: To Include Or Not To Include A Slice Of Cake In The Lgbtq+ Community, Devin Oliva-Farrell

Tredway Library Prize for First-Year Research

Due to the growing number of sexual orientations and genders that have joined the LGBTQ+ community, a debate has sparked on whether all of these should be included. Specifically, this paper analyzes the debate on whether asexuality should be included or excluded from the group. The results from including or excluding asexuality will have drastic effects on the LGBTQ+ community, self-identified asexuals, and society as a whole when it comes to examining sexualities and genders.

This is illustrated in the following ways: 1) examining the definition of asexuality; 2) exploring the debates surrounding its inclusion or exclusion; 3) highlighting the …

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans And Queer + (Lgbtq+) Experiences While Accessing Healthcare And Social Services Within Brantford/Brant County, Christine Wildman

Social Justice and Community Engagement

The purpose of the qualitative study was to better understand how Brantford/Brant County LGBTQ+ community members experience accessing healthcare and social services. Over one month I interviewed 8 LGBTQ+ community members and conducted a focus group with 4 Trans and Gender non-conforming individuals. An intersectional feminist and critical Trans politic analysis was used to understand how LGBTQ+ community members experience accessing care. The results reveal that LGBTQ+ community members experience structural violence through oppressive administrative practices. Specifically, heteronormative and homonormative behaviors and assumed heterosexuality and/or gender, which creates a climate where LGBTQ+ people do not feel safe seeking healthcare and/or …

La Búsqueda De Una Agenda En Común: Una Mirada Feminista A Las Organizaciones Lgbti En Nicaragua, Rachel Crane

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

In the global context, we are amidst a rapidly changing rights landscape for people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) as more and more governments begin to recognize same-gender partnerships. This gain in LGBT rights worldwide is in no small part to the political organizing and lobbying done by LGBT-rights organizations. Nicaragua’s history with gaining LGBT rights is relatively new, as the government did not repeal the anti-sodomy law here until 2008, thus stagnating the fight for acceptance in the country. As it stands, Nicaragua has a few legal protections for LGBT people, but they continue to …

How Law Shapes Experiences Of Parenthood For Same-Sex Couples, Nicholas K. Park, Emily Kazyak, Kathleen S. Slauson-Blevins

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Gay, lesbian, and bisexual (GLB) parents are increasingly common and visible, but they face a number of social and legal barriers in the United States. Using legal consciousness as a theoretical framework, we draw on data from 51 interviews with GLB parents in California and Nebraska to explore how laws impact experiences of parenthood. Specifically, we address how the legal context influences three domains: the methods used to become parents, decisions about where to live, and experiences of family recognition. Law and perception of the law make some pathways to parenthood difficult or unattainable depending on state of residence. Parents …

Normaal Is Gek Genoeg: Homonormativity & Inclusivity In Amsterdam’S Lgbtq Community, Devin Hanley

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This paper examines the mechanics of inclusivity and exclusion within a homonormative framework in lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) spaces in modern-day Amsterdam. Using interviews from five participants involved in various capacities with LGBT/Q spaces in the city, the following paper asserts that the divide between the LGB and TQ communities in the city is predicated, in large part, on the openness in each community towards nonnormative sexual and (especially) gender expressions. In conclusion, it offers suggestions for further inquiry into intersectional inclusion and exclusion factors in these spaces, as well as an examination of the pronounced political …

Gay After Graduation, Laura J. Koenig

SURGE

I first went public with my sexual orientation over Surge last spring–my last semester at Gettysburg before graduation. I was scared, but ultimately lucky to be met with support from my friends and family. People generally accepted my sexuality and then moved on. Actually, life went on so quickly that it took me some time to catch up. [excerpt]

How Far Would You Go With Him?: Interethnic Romantic And Sexual Encounters And Relations Among Men In The Dutch Context, Dillon C. Harvey

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This report seeks to explore the experiences and complications men face romantically and sexually when ethnicity and race are used as focus lenses to reflect upon the participants' past interpersonal interactions. The interviews and analyses within this article reflect the ways in which Dutch ethnic/racial norms and stereotypes shape attraction and desire, and how men who pursue other men romantically and/or sexually negotiate with said external constructions of identity. Research in this paper provides the reader with insight into race relations on an intimate level through the participants' personal narratives, revealing the complexity of Dutch race relations on the most …

How To Look Like A Lesbian Without Even Trying, Laura J. Koenig

SURGE

“Ugh. I hate those pictures. I look like such a lesbian in them,” my cousin explained to me while her family and I sat around their kitchen table. After she said this, her younger brother laughed into his chicken noodle soup and she hit him over the head. “Shut up. I’m telling you. They’re so bad,” she said. As the conversation went on, I learn that she was referring to pictures that had been taken at one of her lacrosse practices. The important part is that she was displeased with the photos. And it’s certainly not because someone had caught …

Civil Rights Reform And The Body, Tobias Barrington Wolff

All Faculty Scholarship

Discrimination on the basis of gender identity or expression has emerged as a major focus of civil rights reform. Opponents of these reforms have structured their opposition around one dominant image: the bathroom. With striking consistency, opponents have invoked anxiety over the bathroom -- who uses bathrooms, what happens in bathrooms, and what traumas one might experience while occupying a bathroom -- as the reason to permit discrimination in the workplace, housing, and places of public accommodation. This rhetoric of the bathroom in the debate over gender-identity protections seeks to exploit an underlying anxiety that has played a role in …

When Gender Differences Don’T Organize Process: Studying Same Sex Couples, Naveen Jonathan

Marriage and Family Therapy Faculty Presentations

Reflects on a study of same-sex couples and the amount of equality between partners in their relationships.

An Activist's Guide To Lesbian History: A Companion To The Video Not Just Passing Through, Polly Thistlethwaite

Publications and Research

This guide, designed to accompany the video Not Just Passing Through, contains guidelines for conducting oral history, forms for donating material to mainstream and community based archives, and lessons for engaging lesbian history with activism.

The Lesbian And Gay Past: An Interpretive Battleground, Polly Thistlethwaite

Publications and Research

The lesbian and gay past is an interpretive battleground that mainstream archives have refused to enter, assuming few risks in collecting, naming, or identifying archival collections. At the same time, libraries offer up worlds to those who work to unearth the secrets there.

The New York Public Library's 1994 "Becoming Visible" exhibit trumpeted The Arrival of lesbian and gay history to New York's cultural mainstream. The NYPL exhibit denies the library's role in secreting lesbian and gay history, and diminished the contributions of community-based archives to the exhibit.

Gays And Lesbians In Library History, Polly Thistlethwaite

Publications and Research

Summarizes gay and lesbian activism in librarianship and the role of libraries in supporting gay and lesbian movements.

The Lesbian Herstory Archives, Polly Thistlethwaite

Publications and Research

An introduction to the history and radical practice of New York City's Lesbian Herstory Archives with discussion of the period-specific situation of the archive housed in, but outgrowing, private quarters.

To Tell The Truth: The Lesbian Herstory Archives: Chronicling A People And Fighting Invisibility Since 1974, Polly Thistlethwaite

Publications and Research

A portrait of the Lesbian Herstory Archives by a volunteer, describing the archive in its original home in Joan Nestle's Upper West Side New York City apartment that she shared with Mabel Hampton. Originally published in Out/Week Magazine.