intersections between gender, race & class. Issues of power and subjectivity. LGBTI issues

Paper delivered at the University of Michigan history department's graduate conference. This paper describes the tensions between established, white gay AIDS service providers and African American AIDS activists as the extent of the AIDS epidemic among the city's communities of color became clear during the middle of the 1980s, leading to the establishment of Blacks Educating Blacks About Sexual Health Issues (BEBASHI), the nation's first black AIDS service organization.

The increased diversity of workplaces is characterised by employees with diverse backgrounds and belonging to different social groups determined by culture, sex, gender, and race.  However, the need for diversity calls for the inclusion of marginalised social groups such as the LGBT Community, While both the legal and corporate spheres have dedicated efforts towards inclusion, individuals are still at risk of discrimination and harassment in their workplaces, thereby undermining a workplace’s occupational suitability.
This research explores LGBT discrimination and harassment at Tesco in an attempt to identify recommendations and reduce these unhealthy incidences and their impact on employees.  This is because while existing literature on LGBT discrimination and harassment have been extensive, LGBT individuals are still at risk, with many having to hide their sexual orientation and gender identity to avoid attention and negative perceptions by their workmates.  This research recognises that the lack of optimal uptake or legal and corporate frameworks and best practices are based on context, which explains the lack of a universally applicable anti-discrimination and anti-harassment policy and practice model.  As such, the paper utilises a qualitative and inductive approach to explore LGBT discrimination and harassment and Tesco to identify the context-specific factors that account for discrimination and harassment.
This article identifies that major flaws are evident in the formulation and implementation of LGBT anti-discrimination and anti-harassment policies at Tesco, which should be applicable in relationships and interactions amongst staff and customers.  In addition, there is a lack of competencies amongst middle management and supervisors with regards to handling discrimination and harassment issues.  Finally, LGBT employees within Tesco do not have benefits that individuals in other companies enjoy.  As such, the paper calls for regular policy updating, creation of benefits, training for managers and leaders, empowerment of employees, and top leadership commitment.

In 2014, Black feminist scholar bell hooks called for humor to be utilized as political weaponry in the current, post-1990s wave of intersectional activism at the National Women’s Studies Association conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Her call continues to challenge current stand-up comics to acknowledge intersectionality, particularly the perspectives of women of color, and to encourage comics to actively intervene in unsettling the notion that our U.S. culture is “post-gendered” or “post-racial.” This dissertation examines ways in which comics are heeding bell hooks’s call to action, focusing on the work of stand-up artists who forge a bridge between comedy and political activism by performing intersectional perspectives that expand their work beyond the entertainment value of the stage. Though performers of color and white female performers have always been working to subvert the normalcy of white male-dominated, comic space simply by taking the stage, this dissertation focuses on comics who continue to embody and challenge the current wave of intersectional activism by pushing the socially constructed boundaries of race, gender, sexuality, class, and able-bodiedness. Utilizing performance analysis, gender theory, queer theory, critical race theory, and humor studies, this dissertation unpacks the ways that stand-up performers engage the comedic stage as their own form of public intellectualism and social critique in the #BlackLivesMatter era.
This dissertation is driven by a central question: what performative strategies – defined throughout as ways in which comics structure the content, delivery, and space of their performances in specific ways that convey meaning – do stand-up comedians use to invite audiences to see them as intersectional subjects that live in the wholeness of their identities? Throughout the dissertation, I examine how comedians are using specific tactics of performance that reflect a fullness of identity as intersections of race, gender, class, sexuality, and (dis)ability. The first chapter examines the work of specific performers to demonstrate ways in which stand-up comedians blend public intellectual work with social activism through their comedy to convey intersectional standpoints in the 21st century. The second chapter explores the work of Black female American stand-up comedians as a challenge to the ways in which the normative whiteness of fourth wave feminism fails to acknowledge the labor of women of color, despite its purported ethos to do so. Chapter three considers the work of performers examining gender, sexuality, and (dis)ability from a white positionality and critiques such work in terms of ways it does or does not engage with race and whiteness as a core component of intersectionality. The final chapter ponders how the use of humor, as a tool of intersectional activism, loses or gains efficacy when performed from transnational perspectives. Ultimately, this dissertation argues that 21st century stand-up answers hooks’s call, serving as a site to address and perform social justice activism by using humor as the connective tissue between these spaces of social discourse, comedy, and traditional street protest.

This paper focuses on the first queer film from Tollywood, featuring Rituparno Ghosh as a transvestite filmmaker, who had by that time emerged as a cultural icon in Bengal.

The paper deals with the politics of representation of the 'queer' vis-a-vis class and access to consumerist lifestyle. The paper pits the modern day transvestite filmmaker against the yesteryear female impersonator of Bengali folk theatre, Chapal Rani (who plays himself in the film), to delineate the trajectory of sexual identity politics in Bengal, and how it has been largely hegemonized by city-centric neo-liberal discourses of sexual identities, which have, unwittingly, established a power hierarchy within the LGBTQ community: the neo-liberal gay man and his local counterpart, who might not even identify with imported terms labeling sexually deviant individuals.

The last segment of the paper turns its attention to the social and political implications of casting Rituparno Ghosh as protagonist. While it was indeed iconoclastic on part of Ghosh to agree to essay the role, it is undeniable that this casting ended up generating a "queer" stereotype in the Bengali middle-class cultural domain. Because of the absence of any other queer icon, Rituparno Ghosh and parallel sexual identities have almost become synonymous within the consciousness of the less-informed middle class Bengalis. This has led to an extremely essentialized notions of queerness, which is hard to dispel.

WHY ARE FAGGOTS SO AFRAID OF FAGGOTS? Flaming Challenges to Masculinity, Objectification, and the Desire to Conform [Paperback] ISBN-10: 1-84935-088-4; ISBN-13: 978-1-84935-088-4 (232 pages); © 2012 AK Press | ALL RIGHTS RESERVED | 674A 23RD ST OAKLAND CA 94162 USA | +1.510.208.1700 | akpress.org.

An Anthology of Critical & Creative Essays on Queer Counterculture Reform, edited by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore (cf. http://mattildabernsteinsycamore.com/ ; etc.) and feat. "IT GETS BETTER?" (Sycamore 115-122, 207) : a creative personal history essay, by Matthew D. Blanchard (cf. http://gplus.to/matthewblanchard ; etc.).

'Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots? challenges not just the violence of straight homophobia but the hypocrisy of mainstream gay norms that say the only way to stay safe is to act straight: get married, join the military, adopt kids! Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore reinvokes the anger, flamboyance, and subversion once thriving in gay subcultures in order to create something dangerous and lovely: an exploration of the perils of assimilation; a call for accountability; a vision for change. A sassy and splintering emergency intervention!'

— Product Description. 'Amazon.com: Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?: Flaming Challenges to Masculinity, Objectification, and the Desire to Conform (9781849350884): Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore: Books,' Amazon.com. Amazon.com, Inc. 2011; http://amzn.to/FaggotsAfraid (accessed: 01 Oct. 2011).

Employee voice has largely been examined as a universal concept in unionized and non-unionized settings, with insufficient attention to diversity of workers (Rank, 2009). As invisible minorities, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender employees provide a valuable focal point from which to examine employee voice mechanisms. Positing that gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (GLBT) employees are often silenced by what is perceived as “normal” in work organizations, this paper considers some of the negative consequences of this silencing, and proposes ways in which voices of GLBT employees and other invisible minorities may be heard. With its relevance to policies and practices in other organizations, the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy of the U.S. military is used as a lens through which to analyze voice, silence, and GLBT employees. Specific recommendations are provided for HR managers to facilitate the expression of voice for GLBT employees in today’s increasingly diverse organizations.

This article explores the results of a qualitative community-based research project on the intersectional experiences of sexual minority refugees living in Canada. Undertaken between 2008 and 2010, this study examines sexual minority refugees’ multifaceted experiences of migration, the refugee determination process, and settlement. Through an analysis of the interrelated themes of identity, refugeeness, and belonging, we hope to further investigate the ways in which Canadian refugee policies, social institutions, and dominant discourses contribute to the sociopolitical construction of sexual minority refugees. We conclude with an exploration of strategies for increasing protection of sexual minority refugees in Canada.

Cross-cultural counseling is imperative in the training of any therapist, yet there are no educational models based on drama therapy techniques. The author explores the need for an embodied multicultural self-assessment for drama therapy students and presents an approach that incorporates Robert Landy’s role theory and Pamela A. Hays’ ADDRESSING framework.

Throughout history, has there ever been a civilization without class division? In the light of first civilizations have formed after the hunters and gatherers, over thousand years, there have been many civilizations passing away and every period of history, class is something that has existed throughout societies. In like manner, nowadays, even though the world has modernized more than ever before and even though the importance of individual life, civil rights and social consciousness have increased, race-based social class has never disappeared. Therefore, race and class mostly have intersected throughout history due to political and social factors

The neo-insurrectionist network known as Bash Back! has contributed to the queering of the animal liberation discourse through the publication of their 2010 communiqué entitled, “Bash Back!ers in Support of Autonomous Animal Action Call For Trans-Species Solidarity With Tillikum.” The politic developed by the larger movement of neo-insurrectionist Queers, as exemplified by Bash Back!, has served to disrupt anthropocentric notions of human-liberator, animal-captive that form the centerpiece of the animal liberation discourse. Through their appropriation of an attack wherein an orca whale killed its trainer at SeaWorld, Bash Back! problematizes not only the normalized domestication of non-human animals for entertainment, but also the discourse used to critique such enslavement. Through satirical posturing and a liberatory framework, Bash Back! attempts to draw intersectional connection between the systems of domination that enslave both non-human animals and non-heterosexual Queers. Through a queering of this understanding of liberation, Bash Back! serves to shift the animal liberation discourse away from the human centric “total liberation” framework, and towards an anti-speciest framework proposed herein, termed “total solidarity.”

The term cisgender (from the Latin cis-, meaning “on the same side as”) can be used to describe individuals who possess, from birth and into adulthood, the male or female reproductive organs (sex) typical of the social category of man or woman (gender) to which that individual was assigned at birth. Hence a cisgender person's gender is on the same side as their birth-assigned sex, in contrast to which a transgender person's gender is on the other side (trans-) of their birth-assigned sex.

Deakin University and the Australian GLBTIQ Multicultural Council Inc. (AGMC) are pleased to provide this research report to the Victorian Commissioner for Gender and Sexuality, Ro Allen, and the Advisory Group: Carmel Guerra, CEO of the Centre for Multicultural Youth; Soo-Lin Quek, Knowledge & Advocacy Manager of the Centre for Multicultural Youth; and Matt Dixon, Director of the Equality Branch of the Department of Premier and Cabinet. The research project involved conducting a case study analysis of the needs of SSAGD (same-sex attracted and gender diverse) young people of multicultural and multifaith (MCMF) backgrounds, and how these needs can be addressed by government, and by their cultural and religious communities.

“Décoloniser Le Féminisme: Intersectionnalités, Assemblages, Co-Formations, Co-Productions” (Decolonizing Feminism: Intersectionalities, Assemblages, Co-Formations, Co-Productions). Cahiers du CEDREF. Special Issue on Intersectionalities and Colonialism. (January 2015).

This paper draws from research on small-scale maize production in Mexico’s Central Highland region to discuss the geopolitical implications of everyday agricultural practices. An overwhelming majority of maize farmers in this region, as well as in the country more broadly, continue to cultivate locally-adapted maize varieties they have bred themselves – criollo maize is the vernacular term – despite decades of concerted government attempts to effect the widespread adoption of commercially-bred and licensed hybrid varieties. This state effort to restructure agricultural systems and food security according to nationalist and capitalist priorities is one tactic in a long and violent struggle for control over peasant land and labor in Mexico. By integrating feminist scholarship in geopolitics and in political ecology, I am following the lead of geographers who regard the materialities of everyday life as a foundation for political tensions and conflicts that are constantly unfolding along intersecting lines of difference. Though geopolitics has rarely turned its attention directly to theories of intimate socio-ecological relations, I argue that the field has much analytical and political leverage to gain by engaging with political ecology, and that feminist geographic imaginaries provide a crucial space in which to do so.  This approach allows for an analysis of how a dominant geopolitics of land and agriculture is being undermined through the routine production of criollo maize, revealing new potential for creating broad political alliances with social movements that are currently working toward alternative visions of agriculture and food security.

This course will look at a contemporary history of theatrical, solo, and stand-up comic performance through a lens of how performances have challenged normative constructions of identity. Marginalized voices, particularly those voices of color, the LGBTQIA+ community, and others will be given a spotlight as we trace the evolution of performance, marked by theatres and performers who have challenged the status quo by owning space on the stage. These performances will highlight intersections of identity, including race, gender, sexuality, (dis)ability, and more and will enable us to reimagine history as told from the voices who have often been silenced.

Die alevitische Lehre propagiert den Grundsatz der Gleichheit der Geschlechter, und die alevitischen Frauen* sind sichtbar, allerdings haben sie in der Praxis keine gesell-schaftspolitische Entscheidungs-und Gestaltungsmacht. Der vorliegende Band plädiert für die Entwicklung eines differenzfeministischen Ansatzes, um zunächst mit der Illusion über die Existenz der Gleichberechtigung der Geschlechter in den alevitischen Gesellschaftsgruppen zu brechen. Sechs Expert*inneninterviews zeigen, dass ein relevantes Bewusstsein für die organisierte Forderung von Gleichberechtigung nicht besteht. Zeynep Arslan zeigt Handlungsoptionen zur gemeinsamen Ausgestaltung heterogen (intersektional) geteilter Lebensräume auf. Dabei geht sie auch auf das immense demokratie-und friedenspolitische Potenzial der alevitischen Frauen* ein und verweist auf einen vorbildlichen Weg, mit den gesellschaftlichen Herausforderungen der neo-liberalen Globalisierung konstruktiv umzugehen. Vor dem Hintergrund zunehmender globaler Konflikte und Herausforderungen bietet das Buch wichtige Ansätze zum Empowerment von Frauen* und demokratischer Alternativen.

The “good girl is a beacon of morality because of her adherence to the standards of White propriety” which privilege middle class values of monogamy, abstinence (Brown, 2012, p. 162) and an orientation toward the future. While middle class White straight girls “hold the ideological space of sexual containment,” lesbian girls hold the “ideological space of sexual contamination” (McClelland & Fine, 2008, p.92). To be named “lesbian” is to be sexualized in your identity – to be publicly tied to sex acts deemed “deviant” (Ussher & Mooney-Somers, 2000, p. 183). “Lesbian” and “good girl” are discursively produced as identities in opposition.  This chapter explores how Southern middle class American White girls and young women grappled with the identities of lesbian and good girl. As they distance themselves from the “deviance” of “lesbian” and position themselves as “good,” they affirm class expectations and rely on class privilege to (re)assert their value.

Hizmet sektörü Türkiye'de son dönemde kadın istihdamının en hızlı yükseldiği sektörlerin başında gelmektedir. Hizmet sektöründeki işler, müşteriyle yüz yüze ilişkiye dayanan işlerdir; çalışanın sosyal beceri düzeyinin ve duygusal emek donanımının müşteri talebini karşılama kapasitesi  ve  satışları artırma  hedefine dönük olarak bu donanımın kurumsal/sektörel düzeyde inşa süreci, toplumsal cinsiyet açısından oldukça çeşitlilik göstermektedir. Bu makalede, ilk olarak Türkiye'de Hizmet sektöründe kadın istihdamının profili çıkartılacaktır. Daha sonra duygusal emek, sosyal beceri, estetik emek gibi Hizmet sektörü çalışanlarının performansını belirleyen niteliklerin toplumsal cinsiyetle kesişimleri teorik olarak analiz edilecektir.
Anahtar sözcükler: Kadın istihdamı, duygusal emek, sosyal beceri,  estetik emek, Hizmet sektörü, toplumsal cinsiyet.

This book explores the diversity in lesbian, gay, and bisexual lives, with the aim of opening up therapists′ understanding of this diversity so that they can work in an ethical, supportive and non–discriminatory way with these individuals. Offers a comprehensive look at diversity within LGB populations, including the interactions between different areas of social difference using contemporary approaches Focuses on the practitioner, illustrating concepts with vignettes and case studies for implementing practical applications Emphasizes gender balance, fully exploring both male and female perspectives on each topic Encompasses different perspectives, including critical health psychology, discursive psychology, intersectionality, critical and cultural theory, and post–colonial discourse, while remaining accessible to all.

Objectives: We aim to provide an understanding of the psychological sequela of androgen insensitivity syndrome (AIS) in phenotypic females in order to begin to inform psychosocial health care services.

Design: Eight adult women with AIS were recruited through the Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome Support Group-United Kingdom (AISSG-UK). Data was collected via two semi-structured interviews with each woman.

Methods: Transcripts were analysed using grounded theory and a conceptual model was developed which suggests a way of understanding the AIS distress experienced by the participants.

Results: The pivotal concept is a woman's fear of devaluation. This is connected to her level of adaptation and perception of having a compromised womanhood. These, in turn, are related to her medical management and involvement with others via a support group and in talking about AIS.

Conclusions: Participants showed a clear preference for open communication about their condition throughout the process of medical management. We recommend sensitive, pacing of information to allow young women and their families to make informed decisions about treatment and a realistic adaptation to life with AIS.

Canadian newspapers are a principal source of information on refugees claiming asylum in Canada on the basis of persecution for their sexual orientation. Many articles rely on culturally racist and classist stereotypes of sexual minorities to demonstrate claimants’ legitimacy. Refugees’ stories are further deployed as “mediating agents” to confirm Canada’s “superiority” over other regions, particularly those identified as Islamic. To determine what thematic constructions are most prevalent among Canadian news sources, the authors conducted a critical discourse analysis (CDA) and secondary textual analysis of articles culled from five Canadian English-language newspapers, employing critical race and queer theories as framing devices.

Keywords: Post-colonialism; Multiculturalism; Feminist/Gender; Newspapers; Rhetoric

A presente contribuição retoma um capítulo da biografia de Angela Davis ao qual, salvo engano, ainda não se deu a devida atenção: a formação e experiência intelectual junto a seus professores alemães, Herbert Marcuse e Theodor W. Adorno. Dos estudos de Filosofia em Frankfurt nos anos 60 às reflexões mais recentes sobre movimentos como Black Lives Matter parece haver uma continuidade no modo com que aborda os fenômenos da realidade social contemporânea, o qual extrai sua força da combinação original de duas tradições de pensamento crítico radical que não costumam andar juntas: frankfurtiana e afroamericana.