Using videorecorded data from canvassing interviews between activists and voters in Los Angeles, this thesis examines the ideologies of sexuality that emerge in conversation through the interactive construction of argumentative reasoning and socio-semiotic processes of ideological representation. Analysis focuses on the discursive connections canvassers and voters draw between attitudes toward LGBT politics and beliefs about what causes a person to be gay or bisexual. In contrast to ideologies circulated by the mass media, the data demonstrate broad variation in how voters' stances on politics and morality are tied to their own presentations of self and whether they believe homosexuality is something people choose, are influenced toward, or are born with. Nonetheless, canvassers misrecognize this variation and generate restrictive ideological representations through processes of iconization, erasure, and dichotomic replication. In order to better promote LGBT political causes, I call on activists to rethink their persuasive strategies in light of these findings.
Resumen: A partir de un seguimiento de políticas (gubernamentales, de los movimientos sociales y de la vida cotidiana) en la ciudad de Bogotá (Colombia), relacionadas con la ampliación de ciudadanías sexuales, este artículo trata sobre los territorios morales que dichas políticas crean, y sobre los cuerpos que desea el Estado o que reclaman ser deseados por él. Particularmente se analizan la 'política LGBT' y la 'política gay' en un contexto local y su paradójica contribución a la normalización de la disidencia sexual y de género. Palabras clave: sexualidad; fronteras morales; LGBT; travesti; políticas sexuales Fronteiras morais e políticas sexuais: apontamentos sobre "a política LGBT" e o desejo do Estado Resumo: A partir do acompanhamento de políticas (governamentais, dos movimentos sociais e da vida cotidiana) na cidade de Bogotá (Colômbia), em relação com a ampliação de cidadanias sexuais, este artigo trata dos territórios morais que criam tais políticas e dos corpos que deseja o Estado ou que reclamam ser desejados por ele. Particularmente, analisam-se "a política LGBT" e "a política gay" em um contexto local e a sua paradoxal contribuição para a normalização da dissidência sexual e de gênero. Palavras-chave: sexualidade; fronteiras morais; LGBT; travesti; políticas sexuais Moral Boundaries and Sexual Politics: Notes on 'LGBT Politics' and the desire of the State Abstract: Based on an analysis of government policy, social movement activism, and politics of the everyday life in Bogotá (Colombia), about the expansion of sexual citizenship, this article delves on the moral territories created around those politics, and the bodies desired by the State, or bodies that want to be desired by the State. In particular, it discusses 'LGBT politics' and 'gay policy' in a local context, and its paradoxical contribution to the normalization of sexual and gender dissidence. Keywords: sexuality; moral boundaries; LGBT; transgender; sexual politics
The paper deals with the situation of sexual minorities in Bangladesh. Bangladesh, although historically a relatively tolerant and open-minded Muslim majority country, remains conservative on sexual matters. Therefore, large sections of Bangladesh's society seem to reject each sexual orientation which is perceived as "non-traditional" and portrays heterosexuality as the only accepted cultural norm. In consequence, homosexuality is becoming criminalized to such an extent that not only cultural values and societal norms but also national laws are in serious conflict with internationally accepted human, gender, and sexual rights.
Find out how the tension between LGBT studies and queer theory exists in the classroom, politics, communities, and relationshipsLGBT Studies and Queer Theory: New Conflicts, Collaborations, and Contested Terrain examines the similarities and differences between LGBT studies and queer theory and the uneasy relationship between the two in the academic world. This unique book meets the challenge that queer theory presents to the study and politics of gay and lesbian studies with a collection of essays from leading academics who represent a variety of disciplines. These original pieces place queer
AbstractTo be 'politically queer' at the beginning of the 1990s indicated opposition to the policing of identity and heteronormativity, and adherence to a politics that transcended liberal‐legal claims. More recently, queer activism and scholarship have largely focused on contesting the emergence of homonormative forms of nationalism and institutionalized rights‐based LGBT politics. However, to define a political intervention as queer on the condition that it explicitly adheres to one or other specific political project is possibly to overstate the case. The 'queer signifier' has travelled far beyond its local origins and, as a consequence, has shifted meanings in significant ways. In this essay, I consider current tensions concerning what it means to be politically queer, focusing on queer responses to the formation of sexual rights‐bearing subjects, and critically analyse the notion of sexual rights on which contemporary international mainstream sexual politics is based. Through this analysis I aim to draw attention to the entanglement of the normalization of sexual identities at a national level with current sexual neocolonial projects. Since the signifier 'queer' has spread in many different directions, I argue that it is precisely cultural translation that makes key alliances against both universalist and nationalist queer positions possible.
This paper explores an anomaly in gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights policy, laws allowing transsexual individuals to amend their birth certificates. Unlike most other LGBT rights policies, these statutes are often found in Southern and other conservative states. In fact, these laws are found in half of the Southern states. The array of states with these laws does not conform to the traditional pattern of morality politics laws that is commonly associated with LGBT rights. Using a Cox non-proportional hazards model, we find that the adoption of these laws was influenced by vertical diffusion of the Centers for Disease Control's model vital records recommendations. States with more professionalized bureaucracies, like Virginia and Georgia, were more likely to implement these recommended best practices. However, as transgender rights became more closely associated with the gay rights advocacy movement, this issue likely resembles morality policy. The result being that liberal and conservative elites respond to these policies in predictable manners. Notably, the political opportunity structure in Southern states has not allowed the passage of this type of statute since the incorporation of transgender rights into the LGBT social movement during the mid-1990s.
This article explores the substantive representation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in party manifestos in general elections and regional elections in the United Kingdom, 1945–2011. The findings show that while there is some evidence of progress, there is also significant variation in the attention that parties afford to LGBT issues, and a general failure to fully apply international principles and mainstreaming theory in election programmes. It is argued that an 'asymmetrical electoral bargain' applies: parties increasingly court LGBT voters yet often do so in a reductive and limited manner. This suggests that elements of institutionally homophobic practice endure in contemporary electoral politics.
This book explores the relationship between social movements, sexual citizenship and change in the context of Southern Europe. Providing a comparative analysis about LGBT issues in Italy, Spain and Portugal, it discusses how activism can generate political, legal and cultural change in post-dictatorial, Catholic and EU-focused countries. The significance of Portugal regarding sexual citizenship stems from the impressive pace at which LGBT rights were granted after the emergence of a LGBT movement. In some respects, Portugal led the way for LGBT rights in Europe. Offering a close engagement with sociological analysis of Spanish and Italian contemporary LGBT politics, this case study provides an opportunity to rethink collective action and sexual citizenship, contributing to timely theoretical and political debates. Based on extensive fieldwork and original qualitative analysis, the book suggests the notion of 'syncretic activism' as a third way of approaching the debate between assimilationism and radicalism. The notion of syncretic activism offers a synthesis of transformative, transgressive and deconstructionist approaches to identity within diversity politics. These findings have direct implications in the understanding and political potential of collective action, highlighting the complex interplay between aims, strategies and outcomes of LGBT activism in Southern Europe.
Karma Chavez's forthcoming book, Queer Migration Politics, suggests that neither the inclusionary politics of the mainstream US LGBT rights movement nor the utopian turn in some queer theory sufficiently capture the possibilities for queer politics in this moment. Drawing on the rhetoric of activists working at the various intersections and convergences of queer and immigration rights and justice, Chávez advocates that coalition is a productive alternative to both inclusionary and utopian approaches, even as coalitional approaches sometimes draw upon them both. In this talk, Chavez sketches the main arguments in the book and discusses some of the key case studies from activist rhetoric in the contemporary United States. A podcast of the lecture can also be found on the Decolonizing Sexualitie Network website at http://www.decolonizingsexualities.org/karma-chavez-lecture/.