Introduction to LGBTQ2+ Topics, Families, and Heteronormativity

Question 1

Sex: Biology (mostly)

Answer 1

• ‘Male’ sex = XY, Male Genitalia, Testosterone (hormone)
• ‘Female’ Sex = XX, Female Genitalia, Estrogen (hormone)
• Intersex = People who have a combination of X and Y chromosomes such as XXY XY* 1/2000 people are born intersex
• Intersex people who have surgery to fit into either the category of “male” or
  “female” demonstrate how sex is socially constructed

Question 2

Primary & Secondary Sex Characteristic

Answer 2

• Primary Sex Characteristics = Genitals and reproductive organs
• Secondary Sex Characteristics = Bodily development apart from the genitals
• Muscles, body hair, changes in voice

Question 3

Gender (social construct)

Answer 3

• Gender is the spectrum of social & cultural expressions of a person’s identity, roles, and behavioural expectations (most typically to do with femininity and masculinity)

Question 4

Gender Performativity

Judith Butler

Answer 4

• Gender Performativity = A
  stylization of one’s own body to replicate an image of a pre-existing gender (often masculinity or
  femininity)
• Ex. Clothing, make-up,
  tone-of voice, body

Question 5

Doing Gender

Coined by Candace West &
Don H. Zimmerman

Answer 5

an
Interaction between two or
more people

Question 6

Homophobia & Transphobia

Answer 6

• Homophobia: The fear, discomfort, or hatred towards
  someone who identifies as gay or lesbian
• Transphobia: The fear, discomfort, or hatred towards
  someone who is trans
• LGBTQ2+ Youth (Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, two spirit) students in schools more
  likely to be bullied than heterosexual students

Question 7

Cisgender & Transgender

Answer 7

• Cisgender: someone who experiences their gender to match the sex and gender they were assigned at birth
• Transgender: someone who experiences their gender to
  not match the sex and gender they were assigned at birth

Question 8

Are people born “straight” or “gay”?

Answer 8

• Discuss the biological aspects (sexual behaviour, inclinations)
• Discuss how homosexual and heterosexual are recent social identities
• Discuss how sexual attraction towards “femininity” and “masculinity” is a social construct because gender is a social construct

Question 9

Sexual Orientation

Answer 9

• Heterosexuality = Someone who is attracted to the opposite sex of
  themselves
• Homosexuality = Someone who is attracted to the same sex of
  themselves
• Bisexuality = Someone is attracted to both sexes (or more than one sex)
• Asexuality = Someone who is not sexually attracted to people of any sex

Question 10

How many people are LGBTQ?

Answer 10

12% of the total population

the higher age group is 18-34

Question 11

Main Findings from GLAAD’s 2017 Study

Answer 11

• “Millennials (18-34) are more than twice as likely to identify as LGBTQ as the Boomer generation” (52-71)
• 12% of Millennials identify as transgender or gender nonconforming
• 63% of millennials who identify as transgender or gender nonconforming also identify as non-heterosexual

Question 12

Sexual Essentialism

Answer 12

• The belief that sexuality is entirely biological and not a product of our society (Hint, sociologists tend not to believe in sexual essentialism!)
• The belief that sexuality is determined by birth, never changes, and is universal across all cultures
• Ex. “men are naturally more sexually aggressive than women”
• Ex. “gay people are naturally more feminine”

Question 13

Biology

Answer 13

• Sexual behaviour is genetic and rooted in nature
• Ex. “People are born gay, straight, bisexual”
• Simon LeVay’s research (1991) on the hypothalamus as a signifier of sexual orientation?

Question 14

Sociology

Answer 14

• “Throughout history many people no doubt had what we would call
  “homosexual experiences,” but neither they nor others saw in this behaviour the basis for any special identity.”
• “Just as the biology of our hearing organs will never tell us why we take pleasure in Bach or delight in Dixieland
  [genres of music], our female or male anatomies, hormones, and genes will never tell us why we yearn for women, men, both, other, or none.”

Question 15

3 Types of Sexuality (Savin-Williams 200

Answer 15

• 1) Sexual Behaviour (who you have sex with, kiss, hug…an action)
• 2) Sexual Attraction (who you fantasize about, or want to have ‘fun’ with)
• 3) Sexual Identity (what you identify as, i.e. “gay”, “lesbian”, “straight”, “pansexual”, “bisexual”)

Question 16

“The Invention of Heterosexuality”

y Jonathan Ned Katz

Answer 16

• Definitions of sexuality change over time and are not always agreed-upon
• Heterosexuality & Homosexuality as sexual identities are relatively recent social constructs
• Heterosexuality is not a universal sexual identity

Question 17

Pre-Heterosexual Era: (1820-1860)

Answer 17

• “the heterosexual did not exist”
• Having sex was only for procreation (having babies)
• People were thought of in terms of having “true womanhood” or “true
  manhood” within “true love” (romance not about sex)
• Having sex for sexual pleasure between men & women = wrong
• Homosexuality as an identity = nonexistent (people called “gender
  inverts”, i.e. ‘masculine women’ or ‘feminine men’)

Question 18

Alfred Kinsey’s Scale in Sexual Behavior
in the Human Male (1948)

Answer 18

• super straight to super gay
• sexual behaviour

Question 19

**Heteronormativity **

Answer 19

The institutionalized assumption that heterosexual is “normal”, “natural” and the most common sexual orientation.
Assuming that everyone is either a man or a woman, and that the only ’natural’ sexuality is heterosexuality

-Ex. Assuming that everyone is heterosexual/’straigh

Question 20

Homonormativity

Answer 20

The “new homonormativity” is the
assimilation of gays and lesbians into a
framework that aligns as close to possible with standard heterosexual lifestyles within a neoliberal state, in addition to mimicking people who occupy the most social power in
our society

Question 21

Intersectionality Theory

Question 22

**Post-Gay Theory **

Answer 22

Consider that “to be post-gay means to
define oneself by more than sexuality,
to disentangle gayness with militancy and struggle, and to enjoy sexually mixed company.”

Question 23

Various Conceptualizations of Gender &
Sexuality

Answer 23

• Many different societies and cultures around the world have thought
  about gender and sexuality in different ways than Western cultures

Question 24

Roman Homosexuality?

Answer 24

• Roman Emperor Trajan (98-117 CE)
• Had sex with younger male “slaveboys” and this was not seen as
  “gay” because “gay” did not exist as a concept

Question 25

Two Spirit – North American Indigenous

Answer 25

• An identity for some Indigenous peoples living in (what is
  now North America) who had both male & female genders, sexualities, or spiritual identities
• Some Indigenous peoples had up to 5 different genders