GW S 498 Pre Writing Guide

Pre-Writing Guide
GWS 498 Gender and Womens Studies Senior Seminar
Name: Nadia Hines
___ Acceptable :
___ Needs Improvement:
Part 1: Getting Started and Doing Research
1. Which topic have you chosen for your research paper?
I have decided to write on conservatism within the black community. This is

focusing on conservatism based on respectability politics, particularly when it
comes to sexuality.
2. Topic: Make a list of the specific issues or points you need to discuss to answer
this question.
Religion
Slavery/reconstruction era
Counter dialogues
Pop culture
Personal experiences
Survey data
3. Sources: Compile a bibliography of the readings that are relevant to your topic (do
include relevant course readings as well).
Loiacano, Darryl K. "Gay Identity Issues Among Black Americans: Racism,

Homophobia, and the Need for Validation." Journal of Counseling &
Development 68.1 (1989): 21-25. Web.
Griffin, Horace L. Their Own Receive Them Not: African American Lesbians and
Gays in Black Churches. Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2006. Print.
Negy, Charles, and Russell Eisenman. "A Comparison of African American and
White College Students Affective and Attitudinal Reactions to Lesbian, Gay, and
Bisexual Individuals: An Exploratory Study." Journal of Sex Research 42.4
(2005): 291-98. Web.
Ward, Elijah G. "Homophobia, Hypermasculinity and the US Black

Church." Culture, Health & Sexuality 7.5 (2005): 493-504. Web.
Hutchinson, Darren L. "Ignoring the Sexualization of Race: Heteronormativity,

Critical Race Theory, and Anti-Racist Politics."Social Science Research Network.
Buffalo Law Review, 1999. Web.
Brooten, Bernadette J., and Jacqueline L. Hazelton. Beyond Slavery: Overcoming Its
Religious and Sexual Legacies. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. Print.
Patricia A. Broussard, Black Women's Post-Slavery Silence Syndrome: A TwentyFirst Century Remnant of Slavery, Jim Crow, and Systemic Racism--Who Will
Tell Her Stories? 16 J. Gender Race & Just. 373 (Spring 2013)
West, C. "Introduction: Americans are Obsessed with Sex and Fearful of Black
Sexuality." Black Sexualities: Probing Powers, Passions, Practices, and
Policies (2010): 1-12. SCOPUS. Web.
Barnes, S. L., and M. S. Bynum. "Black Mother-Daughter Narratives about Sexuality:

The Influence of Black Religious Symbolism on Attitudes and Behavior." Black
Sexualities: Probing Powers, Passions, Practices, and Policies., 2010. 357376. SCOPUS. Web.
Lisotta, Christopher. "Homophobia of All Hues." Nation 278.19 (2004): 15-17. LGBT
Life with Full Text. Web.
4. Introduction & Hypothesis:

Black conservatism is a political and/or social movement within the black community
that takes on the form of conservatism around the country. In this paper I will be focusing
on conservatism in regard to ideas surrounding morality and respectability politics in the
context of sexuality and expressing sexuality. Furthermore, I will be discussing how deep
this conservatism goes by exploring the history of it by briefly going back to the
reconstruction era post-slavery. It is not my intent to claim that every black person has
these conservative ideas about sexuality, as there have been many who have broken away
from it. However, I am claiming that this conservatism is deeply embedded into black
culture as a whole, and we need to address it and put an end to it.
Sexuality within the black community has often been an extremely contentious
topic. Historically, black sexuality has been a way for white individuals to dominate and
demean black people whether it be by raping black bodies, or spreading propaganda that
black men would rape white women. This history goes back to slavery and its
understandable that black people would want to remove themselves as far away from this
treatment as possible. However, this removal led to black conservatism, and has damaged
the foundation of the black community both in regard to inclusion and growth as a
people. Black conservatism has seeped into almost every facet of the black community.
Its in our churches, our homes, and our schools. This conservatism tends to demonize
sexually free women, and LGBT members of the black community. However, this
conservatism does not seem to hold heterosexual black men to the same restrictions as it
holds black women and LGBT members of the community. Instead, heterosexual black
men are told to forgo any intimacy amongst other men, and this leads to this hypermasculinity which seems to plague black culture, and becomes detrimental to both
women and LGBT individuals. In this paper I would like to historicize the reasons why
we in the black community seem to have these very specific ideas around sexuality and
sexual exploration by going back to slavery and the Reconstruction Era. I would also like
to make a case for why these attitudes are detrimental to our culture, and how without
these attitudes we could have a much more constructive community. I will do this by
historicizing the conservatism in the black community, highlighting attitudes within the
church, addressing pop culture, looking at surveys on sexuality with racial distinctions,
addressing counter dialogues, and including testimonials from black LGBT people.
What do you think your answer to the question (hypothesis) might be?
That there is conservatism in the black community, and that we need to have a
discussion about it and do our best to combat it.
6. Evidence and Argument: What specific information or evidence will your

reader need to know and understand in order to accept your hypothesis? List
each of these points on the left. On the right, briefly explain why each point is
significant to the question.
Points
So what?
politics post slavery
Attitudes in the church
Popular culture attitudes
Surveys
Testimonials
We will see exactly how we as a people

got to this point of conservatism, and why.
We will see how big of an influence the

church is and has been in alienating those
who express their sexuality in nonnormative ways.
Pop culture often represents the culture as

a whole (and vis-a-versa). It has a great
influence
Surveys bring raw data into the argument,

so we can see numbers.
Testimonials bring a legitimacy to the

claim, and we can see there are actual
people being harmed by this rhetoric.
Counter dialogues will address those who

have broken free from the conservatism,
and include how those people have been
treated (when possible).
Shift to conservatism/respectability
Counter dialogues
Do you think this is enough evidence to support your hypothesis?
I believe so, if youre looking at it objectively.
Are there counter-points relevant to the question that you need to respond to and include?
Well, Im making the claim that there is conservatism within the black
community and culture, and that conservatism deviates from what I consider
progress. However, those Im making the claim against may choose to believe
that what I believe is inherently wrong, and would point to biblical references or
common sense answers to reject my claims. Furthermore, there are black people
who deviate from this conservative model.
6. Conclusions: If the evidence you find supports your hypothesis, so what? What
does this research mean in a larger context?
It means that there is a problem within the black community. That problem would
be alienating a considerable chunk of the demographic with rhetoric that is
inherently harmful. Thus, it shows that we have work to do not only outside the
community, but also within. We combat racism and other injustices against our
people, and it is my view that we should also combat this conservatism within our
own community because in many ways it links us to the oppressors.
7. Documentation: Do you have any questions about how to document the information
you use in this paperin handling quotations, in paraphrases, citation format, etc?
No
8. Possible Problems: What possible problems do you foresee with this assignment?
What do you (or we) need to do to solve them?
I tend to have a problem with writing concisely, and Ive never really done an
assignment like this before (this will be the longest paper Ive ever written). So I
think the challenge for me would just to articulate my points in ways that arent
completely concise, but at the same time, arent drawn out for no reason. Other
than that, I dont see any problems that should be arising at the moment, and Im
sure this current problem will go away after the drafts and feedback.

GW S 498 Pre Writing Guide

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

GW S 498 Pre Writing Guide

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

GW S 498 Pre Writing Guide

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Pre-Writing Guide

GWS 498 Gender and Womens Studies Senior Seminar

Name: Nadia Hines

___ Needs Improvement:

Part 1: Getting Started and Doing Research

1. Which topic have you chosen for your research paper?

I have decided to write on conservatism within the black community. This is

Loiacano, Darryl K. "Gay Identity Issues Among Black Americans: Racism,

Ward, Elijah G. "Homophobia, Hypermasculinity and the US Black

Hutchinson, Darren L. "Ignoring the Sexualization of Race: Heteronormativity,

Barnes, S. L., and M. S. Bynum. "Black Mother-Daughter Narratives about Sexuality:

4. Introduction & Hypothesis:

6. Evidence and Argument: What specific information or evidence will your

politics post slavery

Attitudes in the church

Popular culture attitudes

We will see exactly how we as a people

We will see how big of an influence the

Pop culture often represents the culture as

Surveys bring raw data into the argument,

Testimonials bring a legitimacy to the

Counter dialogues will address those who

Do you think this is enough evidence to support your hypothesis?

I believe so, if youre looking at it objectively.

You might also like