Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies Commons^™

Queerness In Oaxaca: Perceptions Of The Lgbt+ Community, Sylvana Widman

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This study examines how young Oaxacans perceive the state of LGBT+ acceptance in Oaxaca. In particular, this study surveys a general university student population, in comparison to the perceptions of a focus group of LGBT+ identifying young people. Focus group data was collected through a survey combined with a thirty-minute interview with four participants, while university data was collected through a survey distributed to 31 students at the Language School of Universidad Autónoma Benito Juárez de Oaxaca. Results from both groups found that participants’ perceived their peers as more accepting than their family or Oaxacan society at large. A significant …

Queer And Trans Migrations: The Impacts Of Presidential Discourse, Isabella Richards

Women's and Gender Studies Theses

Political discourse, defined as “the totality of all speech acts used in political discussions, as well as rules of public policy, sanctified by tradition and proven by experience” (Valerevna and Rakhmatovna 88) has a profound impact on shaping societal perspectives, policies, and cultural norms. In the United States, historical presidential rhetoric has reinforced ideals like the nuclear family, inadvertently promoting heteronormativity and white supremacy. Consequently, this has led to marginalized groups, such as queer and trans migrants, being unjustly portrayed as outsiders or threats. This research project demonstrates how presidential discourse has framed queer and trans migrants as outsiders or …

Asexuality In Science Fiction: A Study Of Non-Sexual Queer Intimacy In Short Stories By Ursula K. Le Guin, Samuel Delany, And Theodore Sturgeon, Mik Dressler

Honors College Theses

The study of asexuality is still a relatively new concept in queer studies, and the rarity of asexual literature poses questions about how media can help further develop this study. This question takes unique shape in the genre of science fiction, one deeply and intrinsically tied to queer storytelling but very often hypersexualized. This essay evaluates the asexual themes of four sci-fi short stories which predate modern vocabularies and frameworks of asexuality: “The Widget, The Wadget, and Boff” by Theodore Sturgeon, “Unchosen Love” and “Mountain Ways” by Ursula K. Le Guin, and “Aye, and Gomorrah” by Samuel Delany. Referencing queer …

The Bloodless Period: A Transfeminine Experience, Rin Nguyen

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

There is limited research exploring menstruation in transgender and gender diverse (TGD) populations, and studies have primarily examined the relationship between menstruation and gender congruence. Findings revealed menstruating TGD people experienced distress related to decreased gender congruence (Eisenberg et al., 2021), and 88% of TGD people expressed interest in menstrual suppression to manage the distress (Schwartz et al., 2022). By contrast, Lowik (2020) highlighted a transfeminine person who wished to menstruate to achieve womanhood and commented on the “bloodless period” (i.e., menstrual-like symptoms in the absence of bleeding) upon receiving gender-affirming hormone therapy. To the author’s knowledge, there is no …

"It's Profound To Be Understood": Negotiations Of Household Labor In Trans Families, Eliza Thor

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

The gendered division of household labor has long been of interest to family scholars. For heterosexual couples, labor is often unequally divided, with women normatively taking on more labor than their partners. This inequality is often justified through time availability, resource dependency, and gender ideology. However, less studied is the division of household labor in relationships in which at least one partner is transgender or gender diverse (TGD). Drawing on the framework of “doing gender,” I explore how performing labor that aligns with traditional gender expectations affirms the gender identities of TGD individuals, making the division of labor in the …

Exploring The Stereotypes Of Gender And Sexuality In Ballet And Its Impact On The Dance Community, Ava Jackson

Audre Lorde Prize

Ballet has been deemed a feminine sport for hundreds of years. The famous words of choreographer George Balanchine, “Ballet is Woman,” remind us of this. While some may see classical ballet as a feminized birthplace of dance for queer men and women, the art form as a whole denies more flexible roles of masculinity. For men, the majority of roles are limited to strong princes, played by cis-gender men who fit the model of hegemonic masculinity. Dance is not exempt from oppression with intersectionality between dancers. An intersectional approach is imperative for understanding the exclusion dancers face, by challenging these …

Aesthetic Exclusion Within American Capitalist Culture: Lgbtq Students At Gettysburg College And The Creative Reappropriation Of Clothing To Forge Personal And Communal Identity, James M. Mikulski

Student Publications

For LGBTQ individuals whose identity expression transgresses heteronormative aesthetic values, mass production and its prioritization of a heteronormative consumer base for profit create feelings of otherness and ostracism. Previous anthropological theory on mass production and advertising recognizes the transference of meaning onto material culture through marketing and identifies the generic symbolic meaning that carbon-copy, mass-produced products hold. Theory and research surrounding colonial encounters attest to power imbalances wherein material culture is imposed on a powerless group, and marginalized individuals react through rejection or creative reappropriation of the material culture, which provides a basis for examining the power imbalance between corporations …

More Than Representation Heartstopper: A Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis, Tracyann Josephine Harmer

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

This thesis is a multimodal critical discourse analysis of Netflix’s Heartstopper, written with the goal of understanding its methods of representation and queer world creation. Through analysis of the ideology of heteronormativity as it relates to masculinity, internalized homophobia, homophobia, and mental health, I expand upon the significance of queer representation for queer audiences, heterosexual audiences, and producers of queer media. Through a nuanced analysis of these themes, I display how and why Heartstopper has had enormous success and expand upon the cultural phenomena surrounding this media. Finally, this thesis places these nuanced analyses into the real-world reaction to …

Hozier, Tiktok, And Sapphic Rhetoric, Sophia Marie Kovalcik

English Theses & Dissertations

Through the process of social circulation and critical imagination, Sappho’s poetry, which maintains rhetoric that women, nature, and love are related to ritual and feminine divinity, intersects with queer digital rhetoric. Via discussion of feminist spirituality rhetoric, Marie Cartier’s lesbian theology, and rhetorical and literary analysis of Sappho’s lyrical fragments, I explore her Ancient Greek mythological, cultural aesthetics. I then connect sapphic rhetoric to two contemporary artifacts that represent or influence contemporary feminist, digital, and queer identities: the lyrics of the Irish musician Andrew Hozier-Byrne, known as Hozier and TikTok comment sections surrounding Hozier’s music and concert clips.

Do Bisexuals Thrive In The Corridor? Liminal Identity, Communication, And Well-Being, Katie Kassler

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

In this dissertation I aim to test direct and moderating associations between bisexual liminal identity, social identity complexity, micro-aggressions and micro-affirmations, and well-being. In Chapter One, I offer my theoretical definition of and position bisexuality as a liminal identity. Next in this chapter, I (a) hypothesize a direct association between bisexual liminal identity and well-being, (b) posit competing hypotheses related to social identity complexity as a positive cognitive appraisal moderator (i.e., social cure perspective) and negative cognitive appraisal moderator (i.e., uncertainty identity perspective) of the main effect, and finally (c) posit hypotheses related to individual- and group-aimed micro-aggressions and micro-affirmations …

Ang Mapanglasong Dagta Ng Homophobia: Pagsusuri Ng Kasarian At Pagnanasa Sa "Nagmahal Ako [Ng Bakla]" Ng Dagtang Lason (The Toxic Sap Of Homophobia: An Analysis Of Kabaklaan, Masculinity, And Desire In Dagtang Lason’S "Nagmahal Ako [Ng Bakla]"), Johann Vladimir Espiritu

Akda: The Asian Journal of Literature, Culture, Performance

Gamit ang malapitang pagbabasa, sinusuri ng artikulong ito ang kantang “Nagmahal Ako [ng Bakla]” ng Dagtang Lason (2009) upang tunghayan ang pagkakahulugan nito sa kabaklaan. Isang seksyon ito ng higit na malawakang pag-aaral sa kabaklaan bilang karakter na nilalaman ng kantang bakla—o mga awit na nagmumula sa [personang] bakla, patungo sa [hantungang] bakla, o may pinatutungkulang [kuwento ng] bakla—nitong huling apat na dekada. Ang pagbasa/panunuri ay nakaangkla sa teoryang queer na kombinasyon ng samutsaring kritikang kapwa kanluranin at lokal, at nakatutok sa tatlong pangunahing salik: ang titik [o teksto, lyrics ng kanta], ang tinig [na kinakatawan ng literal na …

Stony Brook Souvenir And Other Translated Poems, Christian Jil R. Benitez

Akda: The Asian Journal of Literature, Culture, Performance

This essay preliminary elucidates on the process of translating Jaya Jacobo’s poetry from Filipino to English. It briefly recounts the unprompted beginning of this translation work, citing it as an instance of a gift; as well the author’s general translation practice in his scholarly work, as demanded by the contemporary academic culture. Recognizing that translation is an argument in and of itself, the gesture—as it is hoped to be demonstrated here in five of Jacobo’s poems, gathered here on their comparable staging of encounters with gifts that cleave time, space, and category of matters—ultimately insists on a careful attention to …

Band Members’ Attitudes Toward The Queer Community And Perception Of Band As A Safe Space, Brian J. Panetta

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Using Bronfenbrenner’s ecological framework of human development and Yuval-Davis’ analytical framework of belonging as a lens to explain how the band environment might cultivate positive attitudes toward the queer community, this study investigated band members’ attitudes toward the queer community and their perception of the band as a safe space. Utilizing adapted inventories with established reliability and validity, the following research questions were addressed: 1) What are queer and non-queer band members’ attitudes toward the queer community? 2) What are queer and non-queer band members’ attitudes toward the band as a safe space? 3) What differences exist between the independent …

“Éowyn It Was, And Dernhelm Also”: Reading The ‘Wild Shieldmaiden’ Through A Queer Lens., Sara Brown

Journal of Tolkien Research

The Éowyn we first meet in 'The Two Towers' is a woman who has been traumatised by the loss of her parents at a young age, the recent loss of her cousin Théodred, the apparent weakening of her uncle Théoden, and her inability to escape the lascivious gaze of Wormtongue. Marginalised by her gender and by social expectation, her desire to find purpose in her life as a shieldmaiden is repeatedly thwarted. Seeking to reclaim control over her life and to make her own choices, she rides out with the Rohirrim not as Éowyn, but as Dernhelm.

Past scholars have …

My Gender In The Closet, Aspen Balducci

Student Sequential Art and Comics

This book details the transitioning and rediscovery of gender from a single person's perspective. Gender is not linear or binary, something all people should be free to study and discover.

Queer Rural Youth Online: A Digital Ethnography, Joseph Robert Burns

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis is based on digital ethnographic fieldwork conducted in 2023 within Queer subcommunities on the social media sites Reddit and Twitter (now known as X) and data collected from interviews with Queer rural youth members of these communities. The data reveal that social media use directly influences the lives and actions of Queer rural youth, who use the space to build social connections, shape their personal identities, and seek advice pertaining to their in-person lives and decisions. By using these spaces, Queer rural youth build both bonding and bridging social capital, learn to subvert restrictions to their Internet access, …

Religious Queer Trans-Nationalism: A Zine And Theory, Eli Butler

Student Zines

From the author:

The relationship between religion and its institutions, sexuality, and gender is both historically and personally complex, and the intricacy and discourse between these constructs disproportionally affects religious queer and transgender communities.

The "Divine Transgender" concept, embraced by a growing community of proudly religious trans and gender non-conforming people, views bodies that identify with these categories as enlightened to break down restrictive gender binaries and undergo a spiritual self-realization process in the form of transition, becoming closer to God during the journey. This zine aims to creatively and imaginatively manage these relationships and educate about the ways religions …

1. Beyond Pink And Blue: A Zine Celebrating Trans Childhood, Eli Butler

Student Zines

From the author:

Trans childhood has long been infantilized, positioning trans children as passive and powerless beings in need of adult (and governmental) supervision and political intervention – an infantilization which is grounded in cisnormative and heteronormative beliefs about childhood innocence and purity.

Trans children are often seen as disruptive to the social order, and their existence is met with fear, hostility, and punishment. Against this backdrop, trans childhood has become a site of resistance, a space where trans children can challenge and subvert normative understandings of gender and sexuality.

As a former trans child turned trans adult, I created …

A Queer Chinese Pilgrimage: Encountering Catholic Life In Manila, George Wu Bayuga

Journal of Global Catholicism

Starting in the late 1990s, Chinese Catholic priests, sisters, and seminarians began journeying to the Philippines to undergo religious and spiritual formation. This paper documents this journey and characterizes it as a kind of queer pilgrimage. Recognizing the queer theoretical parallels between minoritized populations under hegemony and Catholic life under socialism, this paper calls for attention to the queer work of imagining futures that emerges through processes of movement, encounter, and reflexivity across new political and social spaces. Specifically, this paper highlights how state-religious relations under socialism can differentially shape how Chinese Catholics think of themselves, faith formation, and how …

A Relational-Cultural Approach To Examining Concealment Among Latter-Day Saint Sexual Minorities, Samuel Skidmore, Sydney A. Sorrell, Kyrstin Lake

Psychology Student Research

Sexual minorities often conceal their sexual identity from others to avoid distal stressors. Such concealment efforts occur more frequently among sexual minorities in religious settings where rejection and discrimination are more likely. Using a sample of 392 Latter-day Saint (“Mormon”) sexual minorities, we assess (a) the effect of religious affiliation on concealment efforts, (b) the relationship between social support, authenticity, and religious commitment on concealment, and (c) the moderating effect of authenticity on religious commitment and concealment. Multi-level model analyses revealed that religious affiliation alone accounted for over half (51.7%) of the variation in concealment efforts for Latter-day Saint sexual …