Legal consciousness and LGBT research: the role of the law in the everyday lives of LGBT individuals

The law occupies a prominent place in the everyday lives of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals, and the continuing regulation and policing of sexuality and gender weighs heavily on many people who identify as LGBT. Despite remarkable progress in the area of LGBT civil rights, LGBT individuals in the United States still lack formal equality and are denied many of the protections that are afforded other historically disadvantaged groups. These legal disabilities represent an ongoing source of minority stress and can produce a correspondingly high degree of legal consciousness within the LGBT community.     

Anti-Gay Sentiment Among Adolescents in Belgium and Canada: A Comparative Investigation into the Role of Gender and Religion

Previous research has indicated that opposition toward lesbian, gay, bisexual, and trangender (LGBT) rights remains prevalent among Western populations. In this article, we investigate the determinants of anti-gay attitudes among adolescents in two liberal democracies, Belgium (n = 6,330) and Canada (n = 3,334). The analysis indicates that hostile feelings toward LGBT rights are particularly widespread among boys, while the effects of socioeconomic status and parental education remain limited. Various religious denominations proved to have a strong and significant negative impact on tolerance, with especially high scores for Islam. Religious practice, too, contributes to a negative attitude toward LGBT rights. The consequences of these findings with regard to tolerance for gay rights among Islamic youth in Western democracies are discussed.     

"Maricón," "pájaro," and "loca": Cuban and Puerto Rican linguistic practices, and sexual minority participation, in U.S. Santería

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the United States are, to varying degrees, practitioners of the Afro-Cuban religion popularly known as Santería. Cuban and Puerto Rican forms of referencing LGBT populations are illustrated in this article, which is drawing from interviews and participant observation conducted in the United States, with close to 30 practitioners, many of whom were Cuban, Cuban American, and Puerto Rican. I discuss the ways in which Santería gatherings produce an alternative use of otherwise stigmatized language for "gay" practitioners. Through the use of distinctive language to reference all of these populations, we may rethink the relationship between identities and practices, and within that, gender presentations vis a vis identities.     

Immigration policies and trends: A comparison of Canada and the United States

This paper discusses recent migration to North America with reference to the 1962 and 1967 Canadian immigration regulations and the 1965 United States Immigration and Nationality Act. Despite the similar emphasis on manpower and kinship criteria as the basis for the admission of immigrants, differences between Canada and the United States exist with respect to the importance of immigration for the respective economies, the organization of immigration, the formal regulations, and the size and composition of migrant streams. After an examination of the volume, origin, and occupational composition of immigration to Canada and the United States, flows between the two countries are studied. The paper concludes with a scrutiny of changes in immigration regulations which are pending in both countries.     

Do Social Workers Apply “Love Thy Neighbor as Thyself” to Gay,Lesbian, Bisexual,and Transpersons in the South?

ABSTRACT

Across the United States there has been a spate of legislative bills and initiatives that blatantly stigmatize and discriminate against the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community. This study was a cross-sectional, exploratory survey designed to measure the attitudes, perceptions, and behaviors of Tennessee social workers and future social workers toward the LGBT population and toward proposed discriminatory legislation. A 3-way factorial ANOVA investigated the effects of political affiliation, religious affiliation, and social contact on the dependent measures. Significant main effects were found. Self-reported political affiliation was found to be the most important factor predicting LGBT acceptance and LGBT respect among this sample.     

Trend Analysis of Medical Publications About LGBT Persons: 1950–2007

Although there are currently at least 6 million lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons in the United States, there are no prior studies analyzing how this group is represented in the medical literature. An examination of published LGBT topics over a 57-year period was performed using OvidSP. A total of 21,728 publications was analyzed for topic using information from the title, keywords, subject headings, and abstracts. Several trends became apparent. The largest proportion of LGBT publications (31.78%) was devoted to HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), yet there was an overall lack of emphasis on general health topics or common causes of mortality. Further analysis showed that if publications on HIV/AIDS or STIs addressed sexual orientation, they were more likely to be about LGBT persons than heterosexuals. Overall, the volume and range of medical publications on LGBT persons may not be reflective of the health care needs of this population.     

Trend analysis of medical publications about LGBT persons: 1950-2007

Although there are currently at least 6 million lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons in the United States, there are no prior studies analyzing how this group is represented in the medical literature. An examination of published LGBT topics over a 57-year period was performed using OvidSP. A total of 21,728 publications was analyzed for topic using information from the title, keywords, subject headings, and abstracts. Several trends became apparent. The largest proportion of LGBT publications (31.78%) was devoted to HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), yet there was an overall lack of emphasis on general health topics or common causes of mortality. Further analysis showed that if publications on HIV/AIDS or STIs addressed sexual orientation, they were more likely to be about LGBT persons than heterosexuals. Overall, the volume and range of medical publications on LGBT persons may not be reflective of the health care needs of this population.     

LGBT Rights Activism and Homophobia in Russia

This article explores how lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender/transsexual (LGBT) people’s perception of increasing conservative trends and negative public attitudes affected the development of LGBT rights activism in Russia. It includes following sections: (1) the analysis of the development of LGBT community and activism in Russia; (2) the investigation of public perception of same-sex relations and how LGBT people’s views of it affected their readiness to join activism; and (3) the examination of the state’s policy toward LGBT people in a wake of conservative discourse and its impact on LGBT activism and LGBT people’s willingness to get involved in it. The article concludes by considering implications that LGBT rights activism face nowadays in order to survive and continue its existence.     

Pathways to legal immigration

In this paper we use the New Immigrant Survey Pilot Study (NISP) todescribe the amount and kind of experience that immigrants accumulate in the United States before they become permanent resident aliens. The NISP surveyed a representative sampleof legal immigrants who acquired residence papers during July and August of 1996, yielding a completed sample of 1,135 adults. Our analysis revealed that roughly two-thirds of thesenewly arrived immigrants had prior experience in the United States within one of six basic categories: illegal border-crossers, visa abusers, non-resident visitors, non-resident workers, students or exchange visitors, and refugees/asylees. Each of these pathways to legal immigration wasassociated with a different profile with respect to nationality, social background, and economic status. Using simple earnings regressions we demonstrate how these differences can yield misleading conclusions about the process of immigrant adaptation and assimilation, even if measured effects are reasonably accurate. We suggest that social scientists should changethe way they think and ask about immigrants' arrival in the United States.     

The seasonality of births in Canada: A comparison with the northern United States

This paper presents evidence that there are substantial differences in the seasonal birth patterns of Canada and the northern United States. The seasonal birth pattern in Canada is characterized by a birth peak in April–May, and a trough in December–January. The birth pattern in the northern U.S. is characterized by a trough in April–May, and a peak in August–September. The influence of climate on the birth patterns is explored in an attempt to explain the discrepancies. In both Canada and the United States, there is an inverse relationship between temperature and conceptions during the summer months. The study concludes that variation in temperature alone cannot explain the discrepancy between the birth patterns of southern Canada and the northern United States.     

Lesbian,Gay, and Bisexual Individuals’ Perceptions of American Religious Traditions

ABSTRACT

The cumulative alienation sexual minorities experience from American mainline religious groups may leave them feeling disillusioned and even hostile toward the religious organizations that have historically rejected them. However, research to date has not explored sexual minorities’ perceptions of religious traditions in the United States. The current study examines the variations between lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults’ (LGB) perceptions of whether religious traditions are friendly/neutral or unfriendly toward the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) population. Using data from the Pew Research Center 2013 Survey of LGBT Adults, the author conducts separate binary logistic regression analyses examining whether four religious traditions—evangelical Protestantism, the Catholic Church, the Jewish religion, and mainline Protestantism—are generally perceived as friendly/neutral or unfriendly toward LGBT people. The findings from this study offer rare insight on sexual minorities’ perceptions of major religious traditions and illustrates that sexual minorities have a complex relationship with religion.     

Structuring injustice: partisan politics in the making and unmaking of James Madison University's equal opportunity policy

This analysis contributes to LGBT campus climate research on the quality of campus life in higher education in the United States. We argue that public education institutions in different states face divergent impediments to improving campus climate, and that more research is needed identifying structural factors affecting campus climate. Using a social systems analysis of policymaking at one university as a case study, we illustrate how partisan politics and state regulation make Virginia colleges and universities more vulnerable to political scrutiny and control. Finally, we propose a social justice-oriented policy agenda to address structural inequalities.     

el barrio de La Chueca of Madrid,Spain: An Emerging Epicenter of the Global LGBT Civil Rights Movement

The purpose of this article is to examine and deconstruct the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) barrio (community) of Chueca in Madrid, Spain, from political and sociological perspectives. First, we develop a critical framework for understanding the historical, political, social, cultural, and economic changes that took place in Spain after Franco's death in relation to LGBT issues. Ethnographic research was conducted from May to July 2007 in the Spanish cities of Madrid, Barcelona, and Ibiza, and focused primarily on the community of Chueca. A social constructionist perspective was used to examine sociocultural issues in this ethnosexual community through an in-depth study of the dynamics of this barrio. The theoretical framework of intersectionality and the constitutive relations among social identities is exemplified in Chueca. Hence, individuals in Chueca and their intersectionality perspective reveal that their identities influence and shape their beliefs about gender and symbols. We describe how Chueca reflects recent progressive changes in LGBT-related laws and statutes drafted by the federal government and how these have influenced the high level of societal acceptance toward intimate same-sex relationships in Spain. Additionally, we exemplify and present Chueca as an enclave that has been affected by the globalization of the private market, “gay” identity, and enterprise, having a direct effect on cultural norms and social behaviors. Last, we examine the current state of the Chueca community relative to other developing LGBT Latino/a communities in the United States.     

Gaydar,Marriage, and Rip-Roaring Homosexuals: Discourses About Homosexuality in Dear Abby and Ann Landers Advice Columns, 1967–1982

ABSTRACT

Over the past 70 years, the history of acceptance of the lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) community within the United States has seen much change and fluctuation. One of the places that this dialogue has been preserved is through the syndicated advice columns of Dear Abby and Ann Landers, in which individuals in the United States were writing in for advice to deal with their anxiety over a newly emerging and highly visible new community of individuals once considered to be mentally ill and dangerous. Using discourse analysis, this article traces the evolution of public and scientific opinions about the LGBT community during the years leading up to the Stonewall riots all the way to right before the AIDs epidemic. This analysis sheds light on several moral panics that emerged regarding this newly visible population, especially in regard to disturbances within the domestic sphere and a stigmatization of bisexuality.     

Distinctive features of age-specific fertility profiles in the English-speaking world: common patterns in Australia,Canada, New Zealand and the United States, 1970-98

The paper seeks to identify common features in the fertility patterns of the English-speaking world and provide a model basis for comparison of fertility between countries and over time. Attention is focused on the heterogeneity within the fertility patterns of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States, similar to that reported earlier for the UK and the Irish Republic. The recent age-specific fertility patterns of these countries display a marked 'bulge' in fertility of women under age 25. A mixture model with two-component Hadwiger functions provides a suitable fit. The heterogeneity thus suggested is related to the proportion of births outside marriage. Additionally, there is some evidence that, in the United States, and lesser extent in New Zealand, this heterogeneity in fertility patterns may be explained by ethnic difference in the timing and number of births.     

Employment and child-care choices of single-parent families in Canada and the United States

This paper examines employment and child-care choices of single-parent families with young children in the United States and Canada, using a pooled data set based on recent national surveys in each country. We find that the employment and child-care choices of Canadian families are similar to those of U.S. families. Estimates of a model of employment and child-care choices indicate significant effects of child-care subsidies, child-care prices, and wage rates on employment and child-care choices. Received: 1 February 2000/Accepted: 15 January 2001     

Fertility patterns among religious groups in Canada

The U shape that has been traced out by the crude birth rate in the United States and Canada is well known. Falling birth rates reached a low point in the mid-1930’s; the rate rose to a peak in 1947 and remained high through the 1950’s. In terms of cohorts, completed family size was smallest for women born around 1910, whose childbearing was concentrated in the 1930’s. With data from the 1961 census of Canada, trends in cohort marital fertility by religion are examined. The U pattern appears for both Protestants and Jews. For Catholics, a reversal in the downward trend of family size had not appeared by 1961, although the U pattern can be discerned for some subgroups such as Catholics living in big cities and persons of Irish ancestry. In the United States, however, changes in family size for all three religious groups and both whites and nonwhites follow the U pattern. Religious differentials in family size in Canada have been decreasing, but they remain much larger than either religious or color differentials in the United States, which show no decrease. The distinctive features of Catholic fertility in Canada are most pronounced among the regionallyconcentrated French Canadians, suggesting an interplay of religious, regional, and ethnic influences.     

Playing With Time: Gay Intergenerational Performance Work and the Productive Possibilities of Queer Temporalities

This article examines the tendencies of LGBT intergenerational theater projects. By engaging with ideas of queer time, temporal drag, and the pervasive heteronormative imagery of heritability and inheritance, this article explores the possibility that LGBT intergenerational projects may generate some of the problems they aim to challenge. Through the lens of queer time, the article describes the normativity generated in LGBT intergenerational theater projects as a form of restrictive interpellation. The article explores the temporal complexities at play in such theater productions as The Front Room, a specific LGBT intergenerational theater project performed in the United Kingdom in 2011. The article concludes by noting some ways in which intergenerational theater projects might seek to work through the embodiment of the historical quotidian as a mode of resistance to normativity’s recirculation.     

Immigrant suicide in Australia,Canada, England and Wales,and the United States

Factors influencing the suicide rates of numerous immigrants in groups in Australia, Canada, England and Wales, and the United States during the period 1959–73 were examined. Standardized mortality ratios (SMRs) were calculated for the origin, immigrant and destination native-born populations using the Canadian native-born age-sex-specific suicide rates as the standard. For males, the foreign-born in England and Wales had the lowest suicide rates and the foreign-born in the United States the highest. For females the variation was smaller, with immigrants in the United States having the lowest rates, and those in Australia the highest. Agespecific suicide rates indicated that relative to the native-born, foreign-born elderly had substantially elevated risks of suicide.     

Population Index to cite publicly available machine-readable data files

The author discusses the increased availability of demographic data stored in machine-readable files. She describes the types of MRDF produced in the United States, Canada, Europe, Latin America, and Asia and Oceania. The final section of the paper presents examples of citations to MRDF