Introduction to LGBTQ2+ Topics, Families, and Heteronormativity Flashcards
Sex: Biology (mostly)
- ‘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
Primary & Secondary Sex Characteristic
- Primary Sex Characteristics = Genitals and reproductive organs
- Secondary Sex Characteristics = Bodily development apart from the genitals
- Muscles, body hair, changes in voice
Gender (social construct)
- 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)
Gender Performativity
Judith Butler
- 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
Doing Gender
Coined by Candace West &
Don H. Zimmerman
an
Interaction between two or
more people
Homophobia & Transphobia
-
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
Cisgender & Transgender
- 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
Are people born “straight” or “gay”?
- 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
Sexual Orientation
-
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
How many people are LGBTQ?
12% of the total population
the higher age group is 18-34
Main Findings from GLAAD’s 2017 Study
- “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
Sexual Essentialism
- 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”
Biology
- 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?
Sociology
- “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.”
3 Types of Sexuality (Savin-Williams 200
- 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”)
“The Invention of Heterosexuality”
y Jonathan Ned Katz
- 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
Pre-Heterosexual Era: (1820-1860)
- “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’)
Alfred Kinsey’s Scale in Sexual Behavior
in the Human Male (1948)
- super straight to super gay
- sexual behaviour
**Heteronormativity **
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
Homonormativity
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
Intersectionality Theory
**Post-Gay Theory **
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.”
Various Conceptualizations of Gender &
Sexuality
- Many different societies and cultures around the world have thought
about gender and sexuality in different ways than Western cultures
Roman Homosexuality?
- 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
Two Spirit – North American Indigenous
- 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
