Week 7

This week’s articles covered a lot about how different cultures perceive and accept sexual or gender differences that fall outside of certain societies “norms”. Also, this week also covered some parts about intersectionality but I’ll get to that later. With the gender status and feature article as well as the Asian-American Lesbians it sort of went into how gender and sexual identity are established in different cultures and how that can affect sexuality. For the European and Asian-American cultures, gender and the features that go along with it are prescribed at birth. Essentially you grow into this set of behaviors and traits set forth based on gender. But, if you are any point outside the perceived norm, it's cause for scrutiny. In the Asian-American Lesbians article they refer to the lack of any education on sexual orientation as well as the strict family structure and pride as being reasons for someone not coming out, even leaving the community entirely instead of coming out. In addition, when they do come out these women can face discrimination and receive the same stereotypical submissive labels prescribed to their straight counterparts. Wow, that is truly awful, but that’s not a surprise. Many traditional cultures from the middle east to Africa have these archaic beliefs, but one group set itself apart. When I read the part about two spirits in the gender status and features it only further solidified an already existing belief, before we came around Native Americans were doing it right. The Navajo, in particular, had a number of genders and gender/sex categories that coexisted without problems. It wasn’t until the Europeans came around that things in that part of their lives got particularly dicey. Also, I read the joteria article. The interworking of the gay Mexican subculture are interesting but I have far more to say about how I saw Intersectionality in these articles. The subjects of these articles, usually gay people of color, fall under the largest scope of intersectionality. These groups, many of whom would face some form of oppression based on another factor are now are being judged on race, gender/gender norms and sexual orientation. Facing these challenges based on who you are makes life far from a walk in the park. That being said intersectionality in these communities is key. By coming together under a banner for which all underrepresented people, many of whom have their own unique experiences, people can incite change.