Homophobic Bullying and Same-Sex Desire in Anglo-American Schools: An Historical Perspective

SUMMARY

Homophobic bullying has come into new prominence given its alleged connection to several recent acts of school violence. This article traces the historiography of homophobic bullying, both in recent years and with reference to the original era of concern over this problem, Victorian England. As can be seen through novels and autobiographies of school life, Victorians linked bullying and sexuality in several important ways. Their traditional understanding actually supported many acts of bullying as a way to teach boys accepted codes of masculine behavior. In the late- and post-Victorian era, growing scientific investigation into human sexual behavior and increasing openness about homosexuality changed this picture to some extent, leading writers to understand bullying as a product of the bully's repressed same-sex desires. Both these views persist today and provide a stimulating context for present-day investigations of homophobic bullying.     

Human Rights in the 20th Century

Summary

This article seeks to answer the question raised in its title. To that end, the evolution of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights is discussed in the context of lesbian and gay rights, internationally and in the United States. The political and psychosocial dynamics of homophobic hatred are addressed, including the correlation of human rights abuses to heterosexism and the denigration of the feminine. The article discusses institutionalized gay oppression that serves to deny human rights, demonizing gay and lesbian people to such a degree that hate crimes become feasible. Finally, the importance of the globalization of non-governmental organizations on behalf of LGBT human rights advocacy is stressed.     

Taking Over the School: Student Gangs as a Strategy for Dealing with Homophobic Bullying in an Urban Public School District

SUMMARY

This article discusses the African American lesbian gang, DTO (Dykes Taking Over), as an example of a student-initiated strategy for dealing with homophobic bullying in an urban American school district. A series of alleged incidents of same-sex sexual harassment by gang members on heterosexual students illustrate how lesbian/bisexual threat was used by these women to re-establish a power differential after they experienced bullying based on their sexuality and gender expression. A series of alleged incidents of same-sex sexual harassment by gang members on female heterosexual students illustrate how gay/bisexual threat was used by these women to re-establish a power differential after they experienced bullying based on their sexuality and gender expression. This article considers how these students were reacting, perhaps preemptively and in retaliation, to homophobia in their schools, particularly from their peers, forming gangs and using same sex sexual harassment of other students as a weapon against homophobia and a means by which they could assert themselves in their masculinities, not unlike their male peers who experience same sex bullying and/or harassment and use anti-female sexual harassment to assert their masculinity. Intersections of gender, race, ethnicity, class, and sexuality frame several major questions that arise from these considerations, including: Might their masculinities be uniquely related to their performances of bullying? (How) could homophobic bullying be framed with sexual harassment in both policy and practice? Would this framing benefit or harm students who are bullied? How would/does that change the way we can handle it in schools (i.e., school policies), if at all? Implications for school-based practitioners are discussed with regard to how these students' behavior might be the result of a lack of programs and services available for LGBTQ and same gender loving youth both in and after school.     

Female genital mutilation and human rights

Abstract

This article evaluates five different discourses on female genital mutilation for affinities with the language of international instruments codifying human rights: an activist physician's fieldwork journal; two novels, one a Lebanese-American's lyrical work largely indebted to a human rights perspective and, in contrast, a Kenyan publicist's fiction which mutes that approach; an American activist's auto-ethnography; paintings by Nigerian artists in an exhibition travelling in Germany; and a letter to the editor of an African American magazine. I read these varied lexica in light of recent literature on female genital surgery that tends to oppose academics, mainly anthropologists captive to their training, to activists impatient with post-modern wavering who claim that global instruments for women's human rights should be enforced to stop genital torture. Creative writing is instrumental in presenting a clear moral imperative confronted by the complexities of human lives.     

Citizenship for Some: Heteronormativity as Cloaked Bullying

SUMMARY

The average student of diverse sexuality hears eight homophobic insults per day with one third from faculty and staff. Through a lens of citizenship education, we elucidate heteronormative undercurrents obstructing the acceptance of sexual diversity; in-depth analysis of two such barriers, the public man and the ethics of marriage, are provided and suggest that heteronormativity, with roots in the Enlightenment discourse, is overpowering instrumental curricula promoting the acceptance of sexual diversity. Further, the perpetuation of such heteronormative undercurrents can and should be seen as a form of violence: cloaked bullying. The article challenges the use of “It's Ok to be Gay” kits and other modes of essentializing sexual diversity, and petitions educators to remain cognizant of heteronormative undercurrents in their teaching practice. By laboring to dislodge heteronormative underpinnings educators are enabled to model genuine open-minded and accepting citizenship and effect meaningful progress in the acceptance of sexual diversity.     

Utilizing Social Work Skills to Enhance Entrepreneurship Training for Women: A Ghanaian Perspective

ABSTRACT

This article describes a women's entrepreneurship exchange program that was designed and facilitated with the cooperation of various governmental and nongovernmental entities in Ghana for Ghanaian women. The article briefly reviews the entrepreneurship development literature from an international perspective and discusses the Entrepreneurship Program as a targeted approach for empowering and sustaining women's economic situation in Ghana. Emphasis is placed on understanding the impact of cultural and social networks and the women's ability to succeed as entrepreneurs through the use of social work skills.     

‘We are not Victims,we are Protagonists of this History’

This article centers on the Mexican and Argentinean ‘Dirty Wars’, examining the limitations inherent in human rights and women's human rights responses to these epochs of violence. I situate Argentina's report on the dictatorship, Nunca más (1984), in conversation with Elena Poniatowska's text on the 1968 Mexico City massacre, La noche de Tlatelolco (1971), to trace the rise of a global human rights discourse that has become the dominant manner of conceptualizing human rights violations and gender violence in the latter half of the twentieth century. While feminist critiques of human rights have centered on the lack of gender-specific focus of violence committed against women, this article questions whether the women's human rights discourse disengages the historical, economic and geopolitical realities from which these violations were committed and instead focuses on women's sexual violations to garner international condemnation of gender violence. By turning to these texts, this article centers on the possibilities and limitations of women's human rights discourse and the impact this has on the shaping of women's political agency. This article calls for a critical feminist approach to women's human rights in order to document narratives of women survivors of human rights abuses without obfuscating their political subjectivities.     

A Social Ecology of Bias-Based Bullying of Sexual and Gender Minority Youth: Toward a Conceptualization of Conversion Bullying

Homophobic bullying is pervasive and deleterious, and a source of extensive health and mental health disparities affecting sexual and gender minority youth (SGMY). Investigations conducted over the past two decades across the social ecology of SGMY indicate individual (e.g., gender), microsystem (e.g., schools), and exosystem level (e.g., community norms) factors associated with homophobic bullying. Emerging evidence at the macrosystem level demonstrates the powerful influence of laws, policies, and ideologies on the population health of sexual minority adults. Based on social ecological theory and emerging evidence at the macrosystem level, we advance a conceptualization of the religious social ecology of homophobic bullying and articulate the construct of conversion bullying, a form of bias-based bullying that may be unique to SGMY. Conversion bullying is manifested in the invocation of religious rhetoric and rationalizations in repeated acts of peer aggression against SGMY that cause harm, based on the premise that same-sex attractions and behaviors are immoral or unnatural and with implicit or explicit communication that one should change one's sexuality to conform to heteronormative ideals. We describe implications of conversion bullying for social work practice, education, social policy, and research.     

Anti-Homophobia Education in Public Schooling: A Canadian Case Study of Policy Implementation

SUMMARY

An 18-month study investigating the implementation of a Canadian anti-homophobia school policy found that such policies need to address homophobic ideas, institutional forms of homophobia and heterosexism, and individual expressions of homophobia. Teacher development is identical as an area in which Canadian policy implementation can be improved. More resources are needed to support the complex negotiations that educators must undertake when their professional and personal commitments to equity and human rights education collide with their own and others' personal and community religious beliefs about homosexuality.     

Traversing the Margins: Intersectionalities in the Bullying of Lesbian,Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Youth

SUMMARY

This study explores the perspectives of service providers and youth advocates on bullying of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) youth and intersectionalities in LGBT peer victimization. In depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with nine key informants (4 male, 4 female, 1 transgender male; 4 gay, 3 lesbian, 2 non-identified; 6 white, 1 South Asian, 2 Middle Eastern) recruited using purposive sampling from diverse education and social service settings. Narrative thematic analysis and a constant comparative method were used to identify themes. Five themes emerged from the data: (1) “transgressing gender norm boundaries”; (2) homophobic sexism vs. sexist homophobia; (3) “you choose sexuality or you choose race”; (4) newcomer youth and citizenship; and (5) “multiple wires together … create the cage.” Findings suggest the importance of an intersectional approach to conceptualizing and addressing LGBT bullying and to uncovering the differential experiences of bullying among LGBT youth. Bullying related to sexual orientation should not be assumed to be the only or primary form of violence shaping the lives of LGBT youth.     

Media and Popular Culture Representations of LGBT Bullying

SUMMARY

This article critically reviews diverse representations of bullying of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people in contemporary media: cinema, television, journals, Web sites, fiction, children's books, comics, music, advertising, and pornography.     

College Students' Perceptions of Professor/Instructor Bullying: Questionnaire Development and Psychometric Properties

Abstract

Objective: This study developed and examined the psychometric properties of a newly formed measure designed to assess professor/instructor bullying, as well as teacher bullying occurring prior to college. Additionally, prevalence of instructor bullying and characteristics related to victims of instructor bullying were examined. Participants: Participants were 337 college students recruited in 2012 from a northeastern university. Methods: An online questionnaire was administered to college students. A split-half, cross-validation approach was employed for measurement development. Results: The measure demonstrated strong criterion validity and internal consistency. Approximately half of students reported witnessing professor/instructor bullying and 18% reported being bullied by a professor/instructor. Report of teacher bullying occurring prior to college was related to professor/instructor bullying in college, and sex was a moderating variable. Conclusion: College students perceive instructor bullying as occurring but may not know how to properly address it. Prevention efforts should be made by university administrators, faculty, and staff.     

Factors predicting student intervention when witnessing anti-LGBTQ harassment: The influence of peers,teachers, and climate

Bullying and harassment are systemic problems in schools, especially for sexual minority youth. Previous research suggests the importance of addressing student intervention in cases of bullying, but little is known about how to encourage this kind of intervention, particularly in response to anti-LGBTQ bullying. The present study used data collected through a participatory action research project to examine three factors' impact on students' intentions to intervene: hearing homophobic language, seeing teachers intervene, and seeing other students intervene. In the final model, seeing other students intervene (β = .19, p < .001) had a more significant positive effect on a students' own likelihood to intervene than seeing teachers intervene (β = .07, p < .05). In multivariate analysis, frequency of hearing homophobic language did not impact student's likelihood to intervene. Findings suggest the importance of youth leadership in multi-level anti-bullying programs.     

Food Sovereignty and the Recognition of New Rights for Peasants at the UN: A Critical Overview of La Via Campesina's Rights Claims over the Last 20 Years

Abstract

This article explores how human rights framing by the transnational agrarian movement La Via Campesina (LVC) has evolved over the last 20 years. It discusses how the movement has worked towards institutionalizing new categories of rights, such as the ‘right to food sovereignty’ and the ‘rights of peasants’, thereby contributing to the creation of new human rights standards at the United Nations (UN). It also critically addresses some of the challenges the movement has been confronted with when framing its demands in terms of rights. Its overall argument is that LVC has managed to tap the potential of the rhetoric of rights to find common ground, thanks to its innovative use of non-codified rights. This has enabled activists to ‘localize’ human rights and make them meaningful to their various contexts. However, it contends that further advancing the movement's goals will require serious consideration of some of the key limits of the human rights framework.     

A Computer-Integrated Approach to Program Evaluation

Abstract

Outcome evaluation of group work intervention in residential agencies. Development of a management/clinical information system and related computer applications.

Program evaluation as discussed in this article describes a service delivery-focused approach to program evaluation which is actually designed and implemented in a residential treatment agency for delinquent youth, the evaluation approach represents a practical strategy which applies much of the current thinking and research in the area of user focused evaluation. The approach has been refined by incorporating the product of the authors' experiential learning and pragmatic adaptations which evolved out of field testing the model over several years.

The authors present the overall approach to evaluation and the development of the evaluation model within an agency context. The author's then describe the development of a computer-based system which is designed to serve as both a management information system and a clinical information system. Basic aspects of the computer-based evaluation system are presented. Throughout the article, the authors discuss process-related issues pertaining to the introduction of evaluation to both management and staff and movement toward the implementation of an automated evaluation system.     

Gender and Citizenship in a Global Context: The Struggle for Maquila Workers' Rights in Nicaragua

This article analyzes the strategic deployment of rights and citizenship discourses by a Nicaraguan women's organization (MEC) and the struggle that this group has faced in reconciling the use of these discourses with its aim of bringing about changes in the conditions faced by women workers in the Free Trade Zone (FTZ). Contestations regarding notions of citizenship are explored, and I discuss Nicaraguan state agents' and (to a lesser degree) maquila factory owners' use of notions of citizenship, and how they both coincide and conflict with neoliberal social and economic projects. The case of this Nicaraguan organization's discursive engagement with state actors sheds light on the question: How do ideologies linked to transnational social movements filter into regional and national discourses and become transformed by local actors? In addition, this case has important implications for the larger issue of changing state sovereignty within a global context. A contextualized approach to the strategic use of (human) rights and citizenship calls attention to the complex and situationally specific dilemmas and opportunities involved in adapting this "frame" to work for oppositional objectives. Furthermore, viewing rights and citizenship as always situational calls us to move away from narrow conceptualizations of structural transformation to a more complex and nuanced vision.     

Chapter 11: Motorola Drives Strategic Initiatives Through Collaboration and Interdependence

Abstract

This article describes an integrated approach to implementing a wellness program in a corporate setting. Motorola's wellness program is reviewed, including its history, rationale and strategic focus. Successful integration partners are identified, and strategies for integrated programs are outlined. Education, communication and prevention initiatives and program components are discussed, including recommendations and shared learnings for both small and large-scale wellness programs.     

Swallowed futures,indigestible pasts Post-apocalyptic narratives of rights in Kleist and Doctorow

Abstract

Previous analyses of the intertextual relations between Heinrich von Kleist's 'Michael Kohlhaas' (1810–11) and E.L. Doctorow's Ragtime (1976[1975]) have focused on adaptation, assessing the changes made to the original. By contrast, this article focuses on what motivates the choice of Kleist's novella as an intertext in the first place and argues for a different, narrative logic binding the two. Both texts fixate with great ambivalence on the potential for transcending pervasive difference in the general and common, and they are both post-apocalyptic responses, alternately tragic and ironic visions of transcended difference. Together, the two tell a story of the discursive formation and deformation of the idea of universal human rights – a story that suspends the discourse of human rights between two traumatic moments of articulation and violence (in the late 18th century and the mid-20th century, respectively) that animate, yet remain inaccessible to each text.     

Sociology and the European Court of Human Rights

This article offers a sociological analysis of the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). Adopting a sociological jurisprudence approach, the article aims to demonstrate the unique and valuable contribution that sociology can make to understanding key aspects of international human rights law. Whilst the article seeks to develop an agenda for critical sociological research on human rights law, it also aims to persuade those charged with the supervision of human rights of the value of sociological analysis. To achieve this, the article focuses on three separate but inter‐related aspects of ECtHR jurisprudence: first, it considers the ECtHR's approach to consensus in its adjudication of human rights complaints; second, it examines the social control implications of the ECtHR's decisions and judgments; and third, it assesses how conceptualizations of social identity are often foundational to the ECtHR's reasoning.     

Teaching Successful Community Practice in Social Work

ABSTRACT

This article identifies and addresses a severe problem in the management of community practice projects of students in their second and third year in the Undergraduate Social Work program at the University of Haifa School of Social Work; namely, the current binary evaluation method based on total success or failure of the project.

Using a systems approach, this study creates a framework by which to ensure effective and positive outcomes for community practice projects carried out by undergraduate social work students (Freund, Arkin & Saltman, 1999). This framework is unique in that it draws on knowledge gained from organizational and community theories, as well as instructional theories for teaching social work practice.

The proposed framework includes three components that describe the factors necessary to help transform the student's learning experience: the organization's characteristics, the student's resources, and the evaluative measures.

This inter-conceptual approach enhances the ability of the instructor, the student, and the organization to build an appropriate organizational foundation for students operating communal programs. The underlying assumption is that an integrative approach promotes a better understanding of the components essential for building and evaluating social plans conducted by social work students.