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Bisexual Safe Space(s) on the Internet: Analysis of an Online Forum for Bisexuals: BISEXUAL SAFE SPACE(S) ON THE INTERNET
Abstract
Discussions on bisexual safe space(s) and online bisexual spaces are limited. This paper explores the potential of an online forum for bisexuals, their partners, and people who are interested in bisexuality to function as an online safe space. To understand whether the analysed forum is successful as a bisexual safe space, as conceptualised by Jo Eadie, I focus on the practices, as manifold of doings and sayings, that create the forum as well as on the embodied experiences of the participants. I conclude that oppressive regimes that are rooted in offline practices, that is, mononormative ideals, value, and orthodoxies, are repeatedly introduced by participants in their stories, questions, and replies. At the same time, sharing experiences and empowerment are core practices and have an impact beyond the forum itself. Finally, by focusing on emotions, moods, and ends we can understand why people take part in the practices that constitute the forum.
... For queer people, the Internet has been said to be 'transcendental and liberating' (Maliepaard, 2017a). It has provided easier access to networks of similar individuals and create environments where queerness can flourish. ...
... Scholars have emphasised the value of plurisexual 'safe spaces' online for plurisexual people (Crowley, 2010b;Maliepaard, 2017a). These spaces are beneficial as plurisexual people have been found to receive less support when exploring their sexual identity than gay and lesbian people (Maliepaard, 2017a). ...
... Scholars have emphasised the value of plurisexual 'safe spaces' online for plurisexual people (Crowley, 2010b;Maliepaard, 2017a). These spaces are beneficial as plurisexual people have been found to receive less support when exploring their sexual identity than gay and lesbian people (Maliepaard, 2017a). Further, online rainbow 'spaces' often carrying mononormative assumptions, which can alienate plurisexual people (Maliepaard, 2017a;Monro, 2015). ...
Bisexuality is becoming increasingly visible as the diversity of sexual identities is becoming more recognised in mainstream Anglo-Western societies. At the same time, rigid categorisations that views sexual identity as a heterosexual-homosexual binary remains entrenched in our social and academic contexts. As a result, bisexual people face suppression and erasure of their sexual identity. Further, recent movements within queer spaces have led to a shift in the languaging around bisexuality and attraction to multiple genders; bisexuality being only one identity under the plurisexual umbrella. However, little research has explored bisexuality alongside new plurisexual identities and the lives of people who identify with them. This thesis identifies large gaps in psychological literature surrounding the intersecting identities of plurisexual women and examines how discourses of sexual identity – and more specifically bisexuality and plurisexuality – shape plurisexual women’s social and intimate lives, and constructions of their sexual identity. Using a social constructionist epistemology, and underpinned by intersectionality theory and critical feminism, an exploratory mixed-method approach was taken. Data were collected from a community-based sample through interviews (n = 20) and a quantitative online survey (n = 994) with women who identified as attracted to multiple genders. This thesis uses descriptive statistics and a critical thematic analysis to critically explore the ways plurisexual women talk about their experiences and identities related to their plurisexuality and how this is informed by, or contravenes, dominant discourses around plurisexuality. The data indicated that bisexuality and other plurisexualities are fraught and contradictory. Plurisexual women experienced their sexual identities as spaces for political action and as sites for both community and empowerment, and alienation and marginalisation. Dominant and counter discourses were drawn on by plurisexual women to understand their sexual identities. These findings are placed in the context of how new knowledges can lead to changes in how plurisexuality is experienced, to better deconstruct the marginalisation of plurisexual women.
... Ridder and Bauwel 2013;Ringrose et al. 2013;Albury 2015;Warfield 2016;Renold and Ringrose 2017), and one that approaches it from a queer perspective 1 (e.g. Hillier and Harrison 2007;Szulc and Dhoest 2013;Pullen 2014;Cho 2015;Albury and Byron 2016;Maliepaard 2017). While research about youth, sexuality and social media conducted from a gender perspective has mainly focused on the construction of gendered sexual identities, research from a queer perspective also included other dimensions of sexuality, such as sexual knowledge building. ...
... The ways that LGBTQ youth experience sexuality online have not been researched to nearly the same extent as (assumed) heterosexual youth, although we are seeing a welcome increase in studies recently (e.g. Hillier and Harrison 2007;Szulc and Dhoest 2013;Pullen 2014;Cho 2015;Albury and Byron 2016;Maliepaard 2017). One of the most pertinent findings of this research is that for some queer young people who experience isolation, loneliness, and rejection by their family or peers at home or in school, the Internet can be a 'haven' (Tropiano 2014, 57) where they can become part of a larger LGBTQ community , although Szulc and Dhoest (2013) found that among their research participants (both young people and adults), sexualityrelated issues became less salient in their Internet use after their 'coming out'. ...
... There is an increase in studies recently (e.g. Hillier and Harrison 2007;Szulc and Dhoest 2013;Pullen 2014;Cho 2015;Albury and Byron 2016;Maliepaard 2017), although several of these studies also included adults and/or focused on 'older youth' rather than teenagers. This strand of research has made clear that for some queer young people, the Internet can be a 'haven' (Tropiano 2014) where they can become part of a larger queer community and explore sexuality. ...
This thesis challenges common anxieties and stereotypes about youth, sexuality and social media. Based on one and a half years of online and offline ethnographic fieldwork among Dutch teenagers, it demonstrates how social media provide young people with access to a diverse and complex array of sexual experiences, shaping and transforming four dimensions of youth sexuality: sexual adventures, romantic intimacy, identity performance and sexual knowledge building. Rather than condemning, policing or pathologising young people’s digitally mediated sexual practices, the thesis offers a framework for understanding young people’s navigations of the chances and challenges that are involved.
... This results in bisexuals experiencing discrimination through exclusion, omission and the questioning of their identities (McLean 2008;Welzer-Lang 2008;Monro 2015;Roberts, Horne, and Hoyt 2015), and feeling that they do not belong to a community (McLean 2007(McLean , 2008. As a result, some bisexuals and pansexuals choose to 'pass' as either heterosexual, gay or lesbian to accommodate the conflicts that they often come across (Maliepaard 2017;Bostwick and Hequembourg 2014;Nelson 2020aNelson , 2020b. These experiences can impact on the management of romantic relationships, friendships, workplaces, and healthcare engagements due to real or perceived biphobic discrimination (Nelson 2020a(Nelson , 2020bPennington 2009;See and Hunt 2011). ...
... Many experiences of bi-invisibility and bi-erasure have been researched in 'offline' contexts. Maliepaard (2017) has noted that most existing work on bisexual and pansexual online spaces has emphasised online sexual activities or examined individual blog posts, as opposed to exploring bisexual and pansexual community and identity. However, Maliepaard's own work into bisexual and pansexual digital spaces has indicated how such spaces can be 'safe', allowing connection, supporting mental health and promoting acceptance (2017). ...
Analysing survey data from 1,304 LGBTQ + young people in Australia collected in 2016, this paper considers key distinctions between the experiences of bisexual and pansexual participants, and lesbian and gay participants in relation to social media use and aspects of connection, harassment and mental health. Presenting quantitative data, illustrated by qualitative extracts, we found broad similarities in motivations for using social media and how participants connected to peers and communities. There were some statistically significant differences, however, in respondents' motivations for using social media and who they connected with on these platforms. Importantly, bisexual and pansexual participants reported more negative experiences of harassment and exclusion across all major social media platforms when compared to their lesbian and gay peers. Bisexual and pansexual respondents also reported poorer mental health experiences. These findings speak to the different impacts of discrimination and oppression that young people experience in everyday life. There is a need for focused attention on bisexual and pansexual young people in academic, policy and youth-work domains. Young people will benefit from more substantial school-based education on LGBTQ + identities - beyond the experiences of gay and lesbian people - to 'usualise' varieties of difference in gender and sexual identity.
... Acceptance and belonging within some LGBQ communities were perceived as conditional, and young people felt the need to adhere to social scripts about queerness to be accepted. Some queer groups replicated the rigidity of wider heteronormative system by enforcing monosexism and cissexism, mysogyny, body shaming, ableism, and racism (Bostwick & Hequembourg, 2014;Maliepaard, 2017). This occurred through active exclusion and indirect accessibility challenges. ...
... Online services, including social media, may circumvent common barriers to support, including knowledge, stigma, financial and geographical limitations (Smith et al., 2014;Wagaman, 2014;Williams & Chapman, 2011). Online spaces can provide safe spaces to subvert monosexism, however normative ideals and identity policing which are born from internalized stigma, can still occur in these environments (Maliepaard, 2017). Therefore, safe spaces that cater to the unique needs of bisexual+ young people are required. ...
Multi-gender attracted (bisexual+) youth experience a high risk for suicide and mental health problems, but little is known about their protective factors.
This study explored the challenges and supporting factors for wellbeing in a sample of diverse bisexual+ young people through semi-structured qualitative interviews. Participants (n = 15) were aged 17–25 years and were multi-gender attracted. The sample included young people who were transgender and gender diverse (TGD), culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD), Aboriginal, living in regional areas, and on the asexual spectrum.
This research demonstrated unique challenges and protective factors for bisexual+ wellbeing compared to other sexual minority youth. In particular, the findings highlight the exclusion and stigmatization that many bisexual+ young people face, including from within the LGBTQIA+ community. These experiences were more pronounced for some bisexual+ youth, including TGD or CALD young people. Consequently, bisexual+ youth often had limited social support and a sense of belonging, which can buffer against the impact of marginalization among lesbian and gay youth. Despite these challenges, young people were resilient, empathetic and tolerant of others. Those who had access to supportive environments, visibility, and information on their diversity found these healing.
Wellbeing in bisexual+ youth was impacted by a myriad of intersecting aspects of identity and experience, highlighting the importance of intersectional approaches in understanding minority experiences. The findings underscore the need for targeted and intersectional services for sexually diverse youth to address the wellbeing needs of this diverse group.
... What role do bi-centred spaces play in wider LGBT+ politics?). However, with the important exception of Hemmings' (2002) landmark book Bisexual Spaces, and a few more recent studies (Bowes-Catton, 2015;Maliepaard, 2015bMaliepaard, , 2017aVoss et al., 2014), these bicentred spaces have received far less empirical or theoretical attention than shared LGBT+ spaces (Bell, 1994;Bell et al., 1994;Binnie and Valentine, 1999;Browne et al., 2007;Formby, 2017). Research into the character and constitution of such spaces, the subjectivities they make possible and the power relations within and between them are therefore vital to a scholarly understanding of bisexual identity and politics. ...
... Another way of describing such a space would be as the kind of 'bisexual safe space' called for by Eadie (1993). However, as others have pointed out (Applebee, 2015;Eisner, 2013;Hemmings, 2002;Maliepaard, 2017a), bi-centred spaces remain enmeshed within a wider set of power relations which renders them far less safe for bi people of colour and/or working-class bi subjects, and I therefore avoid using the term 'safe space' in order to avoid presenting such spaces as unproblematic (see Bowes-Catton, in prep for a fuller discussion). 2. See bicommunitynews.co.uk, bisexualindex.org.uk and thisisbiscuit.co.uk for listings. ...
In this article, I outline findings from a photo-elicitation study of a bisexual community event in the United Kingdom. Participants describe the event as taking place in ‘a separate world’, a ‘portable bubble’ reached by a symbolic journey away from the everyday, within which they can recognise themselves as present-tense bisexual subjects. These framings support a theorisation of BiCon as a heterotopic place-event where the paradox of bisexual subjectivity can be temporarily resolved. Applying the concept of heterotopia to BiCon 2008 allows us to account for the relationship between the ‘magical space’ of BiCon and the spaces of the non-BiCon world. Further, by theorising BiCon 2008 as a place-event ( Pink, 2012 ), we can begin to account for the ways in which the space is produced intersubjectively, through the movements and practices of its constituents.
... For bi+ people, bisexual-specific community is beneficial, while still others have difficulty knowing where to find and connect with other bi+ people. For instance, Maliepaard (2017a) has reported on the capacity for bisexual people to find safe spaces online, as opposed to in physical spaces, whereas Hartman (2006) found that bisexual women are more likely to find community among bisexual people specifically or other social networks separate from LGBTQ+ community. Given these challenges, important questions emerge regarding whether bi+ people define and find belonging and community connection differently compared to LGBTQ+ groups. ...
... LGBTQ+ communities. Consistent with previous research (Maliepaard, 2017a), bi+ participants discussed the struggles of accessing in-person bi+ communities and the subsequent importance of finding belonging and connection to other bi+ individuals in online spaces. Participants in the current study also discussed the limitations of online communities and the need for more in-person and visible bi+ specific communities to optimize a sense of belonging and connection to community. ...
Belonging and community connection are important for all people, but are particularly important for bi+ (including bisexual, pansexual, queer, and other plurisexual) individuals due to experiences of anti-bisexual stigma and delegitimization by both heterosexual and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) communities. A gap in the literature exists regarding bi+ people’s definitions and processes of locating bi+ belonging and community connection. The current research addresses this gap in the literature, investigating these topics through a qualitative focus group project with 46 bi+ individuals. Using a modified constructivist grounded theory approach, results from nine focus groups yielded four core categories depicting experiences of belonging and community connection for bi+ participants, including: 1) Process and pathways to belonging; 2) Barriers to belonging; 3) Distinct offerings of bisexual-specific community; and 4) Unique belonging experiences of bisexual Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (BIPOC). Findings from the current study serve as a call to action where important directions for how heterosexual and LGBTQ+ communities can create more affirming and welcoming spaces for bi+ community members are provided.
... Mike beschouwt deze personen als onderdeel van de Nederlandse bi-beweging en geeft aan dat deze personen zich vooral begeven op Facebook en minder op specifieke fora zoals voorheen. Daar waar sociale media een goed medium zijn om een opinie te geven of iets aan de kaak te stellen, hebben fora een rol (gehad) in het ondersteunen van biseksuele personen bij het begrijpen van hun gevoelens, kennisnemen van relatievormen en bijvoorbeeld hun uit de kast komen richting anderen (Maliepaard, 2017b). Internet is een nieuw medium om elkaar te ondersteunen en voor elkaar te zorgen en daarbij op een minder zichtbare of fysieke manier bij te dragen aan het welbevinden van andere biseksuele personen (Maliepaard, 2017b). ...
... Daar waar sociale media een goed medium zijn om een opinie te geven of iets aan de kaak te stellen, hebben fora een rol (gehad) in het ondersteunen van biseksuele personen bij het begrijpen van hun gevoelens, kennisnemen van relatievormen en bijvoorbeeld hun uit de kast komen richting anderen (Maliepaard, 2017b). Internet is een nieuw medium om elkaar te ondersteunen en voor elkaar te zorgen en daarbij op een minder zichtbare of fysieke manier bij te dragen aan het welbevinden van andere biseksuele personen (Maliepaard, 2017b). ...
This report (written in Dutch, an English translation will be published in due time) provides insights in the developments of the Dutch bisexual organisations since the 1990s and the experiences of nine key bisexual activists who participated in the Dutch Bisexual Network and, often, in local bisexual organisations. This report discusses motivations for participating in these organisations, experiences with bisexual communities, activities, norms, and values of the Dutch movement, and more.
... Such erasure is often rationalised through the idea that the individual is experimenting with their sexuality (Ault, 1996;Brewster & Moradi, 2010;Rust, 1992). Interestingly, as mentioned by Maliepaard (2017aMaliepaard ( , 2017b, this belief is also internalised by bisexual individuals, causing them to doubt their own romantic and sexual attractions to multiple sexes/ genders due to the discursive understanding of the normative sexual binary. While the previous methods certainly also delegitimise bisexuality, the method of delegitimisation (Yoshino, 2000) takes the form of a far more deliberate act: wilful hermeneutic injustice (Pohlhaus, 2012). ...
... Such erasure is often rationalised through the idea that the individual is experimenting with their sexuality Brewster & Moradi, 2010;Rust, 1992). Interestingly, as mentioned by Maliepaard (2017aMaliepaard ( , 2017b, this belief is also internalised by bisexual individuals, causing them to doubt their own romantic and sexual attractions to multiple sexes/ genders due to the discursive understanding of the normative sexual binary. While the previous methods certainly also delegitimise bisexuality, the method of delegitimisation (Yoshino, 2000) takes the form of a far more deliberate act: wilful hermeneutic injustice (Pohlhaus, 2012). ...
Bisexuality in Europe offers an accessible and diverse overview of research on bisexuality and bi+ people in Europe, providing a foundation for theorising and empirical work on plurisexual orientations and identities, and the experiences and realities of people who desire more than one sex or gender
Counteracting the predominance of work on bisexuality based in Ango-American contexts, this collection of fifteen contributions from both early-career and more senior academics reflects the current state of research in Europe on bisexuality and people who desire more than one sex or gender. The book is structured around three interlinked themes that resonate well with the international research frontiers of bisexual theorising: bisexual citizenship, intimate relationships, and bisexual+ identities. This book is the first of its kind in bringing together research from various European countries including Austria, Finland, Italy, the Netherlands, and Scandinavian countries, as well as from Europe as a wider geographical region.. Topics include pansexual identity, non-monogomies, asylum seekers and youth cultures.
This is an essential collection for students, early career researchers, and more senior academics in Gender Studies, LGBTQI Studies and Sexuality Studies.
https://doi.org/10.4324/9780367809881
... Twitter offers the LGBTQs "a space to share their offline lives and offline live experiences" online (Maliepaard, 2017) with the LGBTQ community as they regarded online spaces as safe spaces that offer them safety in terms of support and acceptance. Lucero's (2017) study on whether social media provide a safe space for LGBTQ youths to express and explore issues of sexuality and gender found the result to be positive as they feel safe and comfortable using social media to explore and express their gender and sexual identity. ...
Majority of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer (LGBTQ) youths in Malaysia are not able to express their sexual orientation in real life due to fear of threats and backlash from society. Thus, they turn to social media like Twitter to share their true selves and sexualities. Twitter plays an important role in helping the LGBTQ youths to reveal their true selves and finding a sense of belonging to a community that supports and encourages them and in a country like Malaysia, that is important to their mental well-being. Ten participants from the LGBTQ community gave their consent to be interviewed. This study focuses on the concept of self-disclosure between the participants and their Twitter followers. The results are organized around three primary themes. 1) The motivation includes knowledge, private life, self-acceptance, and movement and clique. 2) Reciprocity in self-disclosure from both the giving and receiving end which can be positive or negative. Under the giving end, recognition is positive whereas exclusion is negative and under the receiving end, acceptance is positive while dismissal is negative. 3) Consequences of disclosure in the forms of income that is internal gain and outcome, the external gain. It is found that the participants’ actual intentions of self-disclosure are self-acceptance and self-actualization. They use Twitter as it is seen as a private space where they can be themselves and be safe, supporting the notion of Twitter as a safe space for LGBTQ youths. © 2020, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Press. All rights reserved.
... The extent and structure of an online forum makes it difficult (or impossible) to reach consent with each individual participant in the online discussion forum (in this study several hundred individuals have contributed to the conversations analyzed). Consequently (and in line with Maliepaard, 2017), where direct quotes have been used all participants are anonymized (all quotes used are originally in Swedish and translated into English by the author). ...
This paper focus on the concept of curation that emphasizes intermediary processes sorting and filtering the information overload that characterize contemporary digitalized society. The paper has two overall aims. The first aim is theoretical and the ambition is to identify practices and processes distinctive to curation in digital spaces. From this literature the paper argues that contemporary digital curation is characterized by a) digitally produced and mediated processes b) de-professionalization c) a combination of productive and consumptive modes d) space as a ‘quality stamp’, and e) an increasingly underlying and/or everyday practice. The second aim is empirical and, through a case study of an online forum dedicated to hi-fi and high-end audio equipment, the ambition is to identify curatorial practices and processes taking place at the forum and to understand how the online forum functions as a curatorial space. More specifically, in the analysis of the empirical material three themes are highlighted. First, personal consumer experiences are expressed through narrated purchases in which the constant pursuit of the ‘perfect audio reproduction system’ is materialized as these narratives involve with the explanations and motivations behind personal reflections and experiences of purchase decisions. Second, the online forum has clear power structures. Third, the online forum deals with geographical dimensions in several ways, e.g. by functioning as a space for legitimization where the lack of distance and the use of (partially) anonymous profiles generate both advantageous and disadvantageous dimensions.
... Yet, elsewhere, so-called digital 'safe spaces' have also provided havens for those fearful of participating in certain public arenas (Clark-Parsons, 2018;Maliepaard, 2017). The term has evolved over the past two decades, particularly through association with feminist movements and minority groups, related to physical spaces of safety, free expression and psychological freedom (Djohari et al., 2018). ...
This study of tweets ( n = 2247) explores discussions about a pro-choice blocklist (@Repeal_Shield) used during the 2018 Irish abortion referendum campaign, capturing conflicting interpretations of engagement and political participation. Although qualitative Twitter studies bring methodological challenges, deep readings were needed to analyse arguments in favour and against the blocklist, and to consider what we can learn about users’ expectations of Twitter. Through deductive and inductive coding, opposing perspectives emerge on whether such lists are useful, democratic or regressive, but both sides share normative aspirations for Twitter to serve as a space for healthy debate, even if there is clear tension in how that is best achieved. Blocklists are traditionally cited as a harassment solution, facilitating participation from otherwise-excluded counterpublics. However, @Repeal_Shield demonstrates how this affordance has evolved towards omitting broad spectrums of undesired content, while using blocklists – and being listed – can be a bold political statement in itself.
... The ways that LGBTQ youth experience sexuality online have not been researched to nearly the same extent as (assumed) heterosexual youth, although we are seeing a welcome increase in studies recently (e.g., Albury & Byron, 2016;Cho, 2015;Hillier & Harrison, 2007;Maliepaard, 2017;Pullen, 2014;Szulc & Dhoest, 2013). One of the most pertinent findings of this research is that for some queer young people who experience isolation, loneliness, and rejection by their family or peers at home or in school, the Internet can be a 'haven' (Tropiano, 2014, p. 57) where they can become part of a larger LGBT community, although Szulc and Dhoest (2013) found that among their research participants (both young people and adults), sexuality-related issues became less salient in their Internet use after their 'coming out. ...
In this chapter, we argue that the dominant anti-technology narrative in popular and scientific debates does not reflect the complexities of young people’s experiences with
sexuality and social media. We will use research from the fields of gender
studies, queer studies, sociology, anthropology, pedagogy, and media studies,
as well as our own empirical data to argue for a more nuanced and complex
understanding of social media’s impact on youth sexuality.
... This section does not argue that none of the participants came out to their parents, family, colleagues, or friends. The coming-out imperative is still strong: bisexual people do feel pressure to come out of the closet (see Maliepaard, 2017a) and some indeed participated in the coming-out practice. Recently, Klein et al. (2015) observed the pressure on LGBTC youth to come out toward others, and I believe that the research participants' definition of 'coming out' provides insights into this pressure that they experience: the pressure to confess their nonheterosexuality toward others, as well as the assumption that coming out is a so-called end state of their sexual development-coming out and being out-and-proud bisexual (e.g., Knous, 2006). ...
This study challenges the coming-out imperative and understands coming out as a normative practice in which people need to confess their nonheterosexuality toward others. Interviews with bisexual participants, 31 bisexual men and women who are living in The Netherlands, reveal that they prefer to disclose their sexual identity in mundane situations, spaces, and practices and only when they understand it as relevant. Instead of focusing on strategic and conscious decisions—the focus of most studies on (bisexual) coming out—the authorI proposes an approach to explore disclosures by analyzing people's doings and sayings to understand the emotions, moods, attitudes, stances, actions, and consciousness that are in play when people disclose, or not disclose, their bisexual identity and/or desire toward others. Finally, the author makes a case to differentiate between coming out and sexual identity disclosures as both occupy a different position in the social and sexual lives of participants as respectively a practice and as actions.
... In a recent analysis of an online forum for bisexual people and their allies I show how practices impact the coding of spaces (Maliepaard, 2017a). This study, informed by Schatzki's theory of practice, reveals a focus on the doings and, more importantly in this case, sayings that together make up the online forum. ...
Current understandings of sexualized spaces do not encompass bisexuality. In response, I use Schatzki’s theory of practice to identify bisexual practices and bisexual spaces. On the basis of 31 interviews with bisexual people (18–35 years old) in Rotterdam and Amsterdam, both located in the Netherlands, I contend that creating bisexual displays is difficult for both bisexuals and others as understandings of bisexual doings, behaviour and actions are lacking. Furthermore, bisexual participants find it often not appropriate or relevant to disclose their bisexuality in everyday practices as teleoaffective structures of everyday practices often render sex, sexuality and relationships irrelevant. Nevertheless, people do disclose their bisexuality in conversations when they feel that it is appropriate and serves a purpose and therefore create spaces with a bisexual appearance. This conceptualization of bisexual spaces as based on bisexual appearances emphasizes the temporal and local character of these sexual(ized) spaces.
... Nieuwe technologische ontwikkelingen kunnen een uitkomst bieden aan seksuele minderheden die bijvoorbeeld in hun dagelijkse omgeving weinig of geen mogelijkheden hebben om gelijkgestemden te ontmoeten (De Haan, Kuyper, Magee, Bigelow & Mustanski, 2013;Doorduin & Van Lee, 2013;Maliepaard, 2017;McKie, Lachowsky, & Milhausen, 2015;Pingel, Bauermeister, Johns, Eisenberg & Leslie-Santana, 2013). Dating applicaties zijn een belangrijk medium voor homo-en biseksuele mannen, onder andere voor het regelen van seksdates. ...
This study focuses on young men who have sex with men (MSM) and their experiences with online dating applications. The aim was to gain more insight in the scripts and communication during online dating and follow-up real life dates. In-depth face-to-face interviews were held with 21 MSM between 16 and 25 years old who had had sex with a man they had met through online dating in the previous year.
Bab ini membahas karakteristik umum mengenai narasi di dalam penulisan fiksi roman, termasuk sejarah perkembangan konstruksi formula genre tersebut yang berlaku sampai dengan sekarang. Di bab ini, dijelaskan juga kesejarahan fiksi roman populer Amerika yang diasosiasikan dengan perubahan sosial dan budaya yang berlaku, sekaligus menjelaskan faktor-faktor yang memicu kemunculan invensi di dalam formula yang digunakan di dalam kepenulisan fiksi-fiksi tersebut. Kesejarahan dan karakteristik umum mengenai novel-novel populer dengan genre queer Amerika juga dijelaskan di dalam bab ini.
In 21st‐century Ireland, Canada and the Great Britain, significant changes to sexual and gender legislation, abortion access and associated social and cultural life include the legalisation of same‐sex marriage, employment rights, access to abortion and self‐identification/gender recognition. This paper draws on interviews from the Beyond Opposition research to explore the experiences of those who are concerned about and/or actively oppose these socio‐legal changes. We consider participants understandings of themselves as losing power within social relations and the ways in which their positionings can be seen as excluded or marginalised in public spaces. Examining their experiences of public space offers insights into experiences of new power relations, including state sanctions, that contest binaries of marginalisation/privilege. These positions between marginalisation/privilege, illustrate the effectiveness and limitations of framing these views as ‘unacceptable’ in public arenas. Operating between marginal/privileged requires a reworking of these 20th Century paradigms for 21st Century social divisions.
The Eurovision song Contest (ESC), amongst others, recognises lesbian, gay, bisexual and, trans (LGBT) people internationally. Limited attention has been paid in understanding bisexual and straight male engagement with the event. This article examines how these fans experience shame around their fandom. It argues that the cultural contestation and the associations of the ESC as a widely perceived gay pastime determine how bisexual and straight male fans make visible their fandom. This paper explores how these fans negotiate their fan and sexual identities in domestic and public spaces, and through digital objects, such as laptops, televisions, and social media platforms. It reflects on the positionality of the gay male fan researcher when conducting interviews with straight male ESC fans. The findings prompt further discussions regarding the technological distinctions between social media ‘apps’ and how users use their respective interfaces to limit exposure to shaming for their fandom and/or sexual orientation. This also includes further examination of the digital objects through which apps are accessed and how they shape socio-sexual lives and identities.
Blocking other users is a common act on Twitter but one which is underexplored from a scholarly perspective, particularly the analysis of mass blocklists. Although traditionally associated with harassment, blocklists are increasingly engaged to create individualised environments that align with users’ personal convictions and exclude apparent transgressors. This study uses a pro-choice blocklist (Repeal Shield) created during the 2018 Irish abortion referendum campaign to explore how users interpret these altered boundaries and blocklists’ influence on the Twitter landscape. A metaphor analysis of more than 2,000 tweets discussing the blocklist highlights the dominant concepts in how users visualise Twitter as both a personal space and a battlefield, in which mental health is a key factor. By drawing on discussions of spatiality, agency, gender and online interactions, we can see how these blocking affordances allow users to exist in spaces in which they construct their own parameters to feel safer, raising questions about how harm, health and risk are understood. The article explores how users make sense of conflicting images like ‘safe spaces’ or ‘echo chambers’, highlighting the apparent policing role held by blocklists. Users are negotiating the type of civic space in which they want to exist as norms of engagement versus avoidance collide; although digital spaces have always accommodated fragmented interests, the technological affordances of blocklists provide more rigid boundaries, highlighting how the evolving architecture of social media allows users to redefine the parameters of their own online spaces.
Digital media scholarship is burgeoning. However, there remains a paucity of queer geographies accounting for hybridity and multi‐directionality of coexisting, variegated and embodied spaces produced through spatial media nor the technologies that enable these media (smartphones, tablet computers, and self‐tracking devices). Bringing together literatures on sexuality and the first and second iterations of the internet, this article extends debate about the uneven and paradoxical queer geographies of location‐aware applications (Tinder and Grindr) and other spatial media now often taken as “composite” of queer cultures globally. The article encourages those with interest in the interrelationships between sexualities and space to emphasise further the historical, cultural, and political specificities of the places in which these diverse media are designed, developed, and consumed. The purpose of doing so, I contend, is to deepen knowledge of heightened commercialisation whilst unravelling complex questions of data ownership, privacy and cultural norms that could exacerbate disparities in sexual citizenship.
A collection of six peer-reviewed articles that together forms my dissertation on the sexual identity negotiations of bisexual people (18-35 years) in the two main cities of the Netherlands: Rotterdam and Amsterdam. The articles:
Maliepaard, E. (2015), Bisexual Spaces: exploring geographies of bisexualities. ACME: An International E-Journal for Critical Geographies 14, 1, pp. 217-234 - Maliepaard, E. (2015), Bisexual citizenship in the Netherlands: on homo-emancipation and bisexual representations in national emancipation policies. Sexualities 18, 4, pp. 377-393 - Maliepaard, E. (2015), Bisexuals in space and geography: more-than-queer? Fennia: International Journal of Geography 193, 1, pp. 148-159 - Maliepaard, E. (2017), Bisexuality in the Netherlands: Connecting bisexual passing, communities, and identities. Journal of Bisexuality 17, 3, pp. 325-348 - Maliepaard, E. (2017), Bisexual safe spaces on the internet: analysis of an online forum for bisexuals. Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie 108, 3, pp. 318-330 - Maliepaard, E. (2018), Spaces with a bisexual appearance: Reconceptualizing bisexual space(s) through a study of bisexual practices in the Netherlands. Social and Cultural Geography, 19 pp.
This article explores bisexual passing and participants’ perceptions of (and, sometimes, experiences with) the Dutch organized bisexual community and other bisexual communities in The Netherlands. On the basis of 21 interviews with bisexual women and 10 with bisexual men, the author discusses firstly why people often pass as heterosexual, lesbian, or gay in everyday situations, activities, and encounters, and secondly why people do not take part in the Dutch organized bisexual community. After engaging with bisexual theorising, the author use Schatzki's theory of practice to better explore and link bisexual passing and bisexual communities by focusing on how people, via participating in practices, relate to others and the social world. This theory shows not only that people find disclosing their bisexuality not relevant, appropriate, or acceptable in everyday practices, but also that this affects people's position towards the organized bisexual community.
This commentary responds to the papers comprising the themed issue ‘Geographies of Sexualities: Bodies, Spatial Encounters and Emotions’. I position the themed issue at the intersection of geographies of sexualities, embodied geographies and emotional geographies, and suggest how the papers collectively contribute to geographies of sexualities and to human geography more broadly. The themed issue entwines the themes of ‘the body’ and ‘emotions’ to advance understandings of embodied emotions in geographies of sexualities and beyond. I identify three ways in which embodied emotions are taken forward in geographical thinking. First, the capacity for emotionally embodied fieldwork generates insights into collective embodiment and communities of practice, at the same time contesting masculinist objectivity and detachment in knowledge production. Second, new spaces of encounter – such as online forums and social media – are not distinct from everyday geographies, but instead are part of a virtual-physical emotional landscape that extends embodiment across material and digital environments. Third, the innovative combination of different elements of feminist geographical thinking – such as intersectionality, the body and emotion and affect – generates new understandings of inequality across and between social identities.
Since the 1990s, geographies of sexualities have evolved into a body of work which is able to provide an overview of everyday life experiences of sexual minorities, especially of gay men and lesbians. A review of the literature, however, observes that bisexuality is often neglected. I argue that this is the result of an approach to sexualised space that immediately links the sexual coding of space with the dominant sexual identity. This paper aims to theorise bisexual spaces as a result of bisexual practices, which are derived from the Klein Sexual Orientation Grid. I will also stress the importance of linguistic practices in practicing (or doing) bisexuality. This paper concludes with a call to investigate bisexual geographies in the mundane, everyday realities of bisexual citizens.
Geographies of sexualities mainly focusses on the lived experiences and sexual identity negotiations of gay men and lesbian women in a society based upon binary divisions of sex, gender, and sexualities. This review article wants to consider a more theoretically informed relational approach to understand the creation and sustaining of the binary system, and the everyday lived experience of bisexuals. This article will review contemporary studies on queer space and studies on the intersections of bisexual theory and queer theory. Drawing inspiration from queer theory, speech act theory, and relational geographies, I propose a focus on encounters, language, embodied practices, and embodied experiences to understand the lives of sexual minorities, and bisexuals in particular. While heteronormativity and monosexuality are important factors (or contexts) in the everyday lived experience, they are not all determining for the everyday experiences of people who desire more-than-one gender.
Scholarship on queer geographies has called attention to the active production of space as heterosexualized and has levelled powerful critiques at the implicit heterosexual bias of much geographical theorizing. As a result, critical geographers have begun to remark upon the resistance of gays, lesbians and other sexual subjects to a dominant heterosexuality. But such a liberal framework of oppression and resistance is precisely the sort of mapping that poststructuralist queer theory emerged to write against. So, rather than charting the progress of queer geographies, this article offers a critical reading of the deployment of the notion of `queer space' in geography and highlights an alternative queer approach that is inseparable from feminist, materialist, postcolonial and critical race theories.
This article uses two cyberspatial technologies, namely, the Internet (the global network of connected computers), and its close cousins, intranets (closed, private corporate telematic networks), to illustrate the ways in which geographers have engaged, and could engage, with studies of cyberspace. Virtual reality technologies are not discussed explicitly as, in the main, they are still at an exploratory and experimental stage. The article has three central aims: first, to introduce cyberspace and its implications to a wider geographical audience; secondly, to provide a critical review of current empirical and theoretical work relating to cyberspatial technologies by geographers; and, thirdly, to introduce geographers to the current debates and empirical research of scholars from other disciplines and suggest how geographers can build upon and advance these studies. An agenda for future research is outlined and an approach in which to ground future studies is forwarded. It is argued that spatiality is central to understanding cyberspace.
This article develops a model that describes relations among environmental characteristics, discrimination and visibility management, and the experience of minority stressors by lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) youth. The article elaborates on how visibility management (i.e., regulating the exposure of one's sexual orientation) of LGB youth can function as a coping strategy and is, therefore, closely tied to the experience of minority stressors. Qualitative support is found for the theoretical model in conducting 24 in-depth interviews with LGB youth. The analysis also shows that LGB youth use specific mannerisms, gender-nonconformist behaviors, and other indirect cues to make themselves visible or invisible as LGBs.
Preliminary analysis of early data from an extensive survey of the experience of bisexual people in the workplace indicates that bisexuality is a separate sexual orientation from monosexuality (either homosexuality or heterosexuality), that workplace nondiscrimination policies are more effective in creating perceived safety for bisexual people if they include gender identity and expression in addition to sexual orientation alone, and that dissatisfaction in the workplace, as well as in life in general, can be correlated with the degree to which a person keeps her or his bisexuality a secret. Researchers propose a Sexual Orientation Infinite Polygon and suggest action steps for bisexual people and allies, such as 1. Companies and other workplaces establish Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) policies offering workplace protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity;2. Employee work groups—formal and informal—encourage bisexual employees to be openly involved in their activities by: a. Hosting bi-specific events b. Actively incorporating bi-inclusive language in their meetings and publications c. Educating their gay, lesbian and straight members about the realities of who bisexuals are to dispel the myths that block those individuals support of bisexual coworkers 3. Bisexual people who are closeted might wish to consider coming out as respondents who are out about their bisexuality indicated greater satisfaction with their sex lives!
Internet newsgroups allow individuals to interact with others in a relatively anonymous fashion and thereby provide individuals with concealable stigmatized identities a place to belong not otherwise available. Thus, membership in these groups should become an important part of identity. Study 1 found that members of newsgroups dealing with marginalized–concealable identities modified their newsgroup behavior on the basis of reactions of other members, unlike members of marginalized–conspicuous or mainstream newsgroups. This increase in identity importance from newsgroup participation was shown in both Study 2 (marginalized sexual identities) and Study 3 (marginalized ideological identities) to lead to greater self-acceptance, as well as coming out about the secret identity to family and friends. Results supported the view that Internet groups obey general principles of social group functioning and have real-life consequences for the individual. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
The appropriate role of place- and space-based metaphors for the Internet and its constituent nodes and networks is hotly contested. This essay seeks to provoke critical reflection on the implications of place- and space-based theories of cyberspace for the ongoing production of networked space more generally. It argues, first, that adherents of the cyberspace metaphor have been insufficiently sensitive to the ways in which theories of cyberspace as space themselves function as acts of social construction. Specifically, the leading theories all have deployed the metaphoric construct of cyberspace to situate cyberspace, explicitly or implicitly, as separate space. This denies all of the ways in which cyberspace operates as both extension and evolution of everyday spatial practice. Next, it argues that critics of the cyberspace metaphor have confused two senses of space and two senses of metaphor. The cyberspace metaphor does not refer to abstract, Cartesian space, but instead expresses an experienced spatiality mediated by embodied human cognition. Cyberspace in this sense is relative, mutable, and constituted via the interactions among practice, conceptualization, and representation. The insights drawn from this exercise suggest a very different way of understanding both the spatiality of cyberspace and its architectural and regulatory challenges. In particular, they suggest closer attention to three ongoing shifts: the emergence of a new sense of social space, which I call networked space; the interpenetration of embodied, formerly bounded space by networked space; and the ways in which these developments alter, instantiate and disrupt geographies of power.
This essay examines a self-defined, lesbian on-line community focusing on the construction and performance of identity in relation to coming out on-line. Coming out is a central narrative form in the construction of lesbian identity. In considering the implications of coming out in an on-line community, issues of privacy and public space are central. Coming out on-line can be seen as both an alternative to, and augmentation of, coming out off-line. Questioning whether this on-line community sustains performative utterances, the authors explore the relationships between on-line and off-line locales. The construction of boundaries is considered in an analysis of how sexualized bodies emerge in virtual spaces.
This paper is an excursion in non-representational thought. The primacy of movement charges this creative geography. Movement
as sensation, thought, matter and memory crystallizes in ongoing assemblages (effects) we term selves and landscapes. This
movement ontology is animated by a stream of thought running through Bergson, Deleuze, and Massumi, and by Ingold’s temporality
of landscape. Memory is vital, as past (virtual) and present (actual) coexist, pushing forward in duration, the dynamic continuation
of movement and sensation. David Lynch’s film, The Straight Story, offers dramatic illustration of the entanglement of movement,
memory, and landscape. Landscape is emergent as relational lines of movement, an ongoing meshwork of practices and movement
signatures. Alvin Straight’s paced journey through Iowa on a John Deere lawn mower during autumn harvest is a road to reminiscence
and reconciliation, an American sublime. Lynch’s movement-images and soundscapes are sensorial undulations that illumine landscape
as movement of incorporation, ‘dwelling’ in the moment to moment, geographies of care. The take-home message is that we are
nothing more and nothing less than agents, next selves, ‘passing’ through. The collective trace of our ‘passings’ constitutes
the making and remaking of place.
Although the Internet is commonly used by lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) youth to explore aspects of sexual health, little is known about how this usage relates to offline explorations and experiences. This study used a mixed-methods approach to investigate the interplay between online and offline explorations of multiple dimensions of sexual health, which include sexually transmitted infections, sexual identities, romantic relationships, and sexual behaviors. A diverse community sample of 32 LGBT youth (ages 16-24) completed semi-structured interviews, which were transcribed and then qualitatively coded to identify themes. Results indicated that, although many participants evaluated online sexual health resources with caution, they frequently used the Internet to compensate for perceived limitations in offline resources and relationships. Some participants turned to the Internet to find friends and romantic partners, citing the relative difficulty of establishing offline contact with LGBT peers. Further, participants perceived the Internet as an efficient way to discover offline LGBT events and services relevant to sexual health. These results suggest that LGBT youth are motivated to fill gaps in their offline sexual health resources (e.g., books and personal communications) with online information. The Internet is a setting that can be harnessed to provide support for the successful development of sexual health.
In this article, we propose that adolescents' online interactions are both a literal and a metaphoric screen for representing major adolescent developmental issues, such as sexuality and identity. Because of the public nature of Internet chat rooms, they provide an open window into the expression of adolescent concerns. Our study utilizes this window to explore how issues of sexuality and identity are constructed in a teen chat room. We adapt qualitative discourse methodology to microanalyze a half-hour transcript from a monitored teen chat room, comparing it, where relevant, to a second transcript, used in a prior study [Greenfield, P.M., Subrahmanyam, K., 2003. Online discourse in a teen chat room: New codes and new modes of coherence in a visual medium. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology 24, 713–738.]. Our microanalysis reveals that participants use the online space of teen chat to air adolescent concerns about sexuality and to develop creative strategies to exchange identity information with their peers. This exchange is critical to the activity of “pairing off”, an important teenage expression of emerging sexuality. Developmental issues from adolescents' offline lives are reconstructed online with some important differences. The virtual world of teen chat may offer a safer environment for exploring emerging sexuality than the real world. Through the verbally explicit exchange of identity information, participants are able to “pair off” with partners of their choice, despite the disembodied nature of chat participants.
The increasing salience of sexuality on the internet, whether cybersex or use of the internet to make sexual contacts, has focused interest on how internet-mediated sexuality informs social theory. This article reviews social theory and sexuality in relation to the internet, with specific reference to the development of intimacy, the association of texts with sexual scripts, the emergence of cybersexuality as a sexual space midway between fantasy and action, and the question of boundaries and the location of the person in sexual interaction. Also, the supplanting of the real by the symbolic, the internet as a sexual marketplace, its important role in creating sexual communities, particularly where sexual behavior or identity is stigmatized, its impact as a new arena for sexual experience and experimentation, and its impact in shaping sexual culture and sexuality are noted. Finally, the importance of the internet as a medium for the exploration of human sexuality and as an opportunity to illuminate previously challenging areas of sexual research is discussed.
A largely unexplored area, this is an innovative and original examination of bisexual spaces as places that are defined by both geographical boundaries and cultural significance. Hemmings applies the ideas of queer theory as well as social and cultural geography in her fascinating investigation into the spaces and places of bisexual life. Specifically focusing on Northhampton, MA and San Francisco, she draws on interviews with community members and the town histories showing how and why they have developed into safe places for the gay, lesbian, and bisexual communities. By mapping out a space of bisexuality
This article explores the ways bisexual identity is made visible outside of explicitly sexual behavior, or outside the bedroom. This article draws on concepts from Goffman's work on identity performance, Lorber's work on gender display, and West and Zimmerman's work on ‘doing gender,’ as well as specifically addressing Miller's concept of ‘doing bisexuality.’ Through the use of gender displays and other visual cues, bisexuals engage with cultural assumptions about straight and gay/lesbian stereotypes, styles, and appearances to try to create a unique bisexual style based on hybridity, a concept the author calls “bisexual display.”
This study examined how bisexually-identified individuals experience cultural attitudes toward bisexuality, how they establish a sense of community for themselves, and how their experience has affected their self-concept. Twenty self-identified bisexual women and men were interviewed for a descriptive study. The results indicate that cultural attitudes toward bisexuality affect sexual identity development, self-definition, visibility, and relationships. Three steps to establishing a sense of community included: perception of outsider status, location of bisexual individuals and community, and formation of new community. The effects on self-concept of forming and maintaining bisexual identity included: enhanced self-reliance, openness, and enrichment. Both gender and cultural minority status had an impact on the experience of bisexuality. On the basis of the findings, the author proposes a theory of bisexual identity development which includes the following stages: questioning reality, inventing the identity, maintaining the identity, and transforming adversity.
This paper reports findings from an undergraduate level qualitative study using semi-structured interviews to assess the way in which bisexuals form an identity and manage the stigma they receive from the greater society. Previous research has indicated that social support and social networks are a major factor in determining whether or not a bi-identified individual has accepted their identity. Other research has indicated bisexuals are in a constant state of confusion concerning their identity. The interviews examined three stages of identity (stemming from sociological research on deviance theory) including the initial stage in which one undergoes their initial interaction with another gender, the second stage in which a person openly identifies as bisexual and/or is labeled as such and the third stage in which a person begins to identify with and accept their newfound identity. In addition, the way in which bi-identified individuals manage and deal with the stigma they receive from the greater outside community and society as a whole is explored.
This book addresses key topics in social theory such as the basic structures of social life, the character of human activity, and the nature of individuality. Drawing on the work of Wittgenstein, the author develops an account of social existence that argues that social practices are the fundamental phenomenon in social life. This approach offers insight into the social formation of individuals, surpassing and critiquing the existing practice theories of Bourdieu, Giddens, Lyotard and Oakeshott. In bringing Wittgenstein's work to bear on issues of social theory the book shows the relevance of his work to a body of thought to which it has never been applied. The book will be of particular interest to philosophers of the social sciences, a wide range of social theorists in political science and sociology, as well as some literary theorists.
This chapter introduces a sequence of four papers that focus on the theme of knowledge and information flow in hybrid and virtual sites of interaction. As the Internet and the World Wide Web proliferate, people live increasingly hybrid lives where the physical and the digital, the real and the virtual, interact. In this world, online and offline identities may overlap and interdigitate, erasing prior boundaries in social, cultural, linguistic, political, and economic domains. My central argument proposes that we are witnessing an underlying process of technology-spurred blurring, resulting in major shifts in the cultural landscape of the 21st century. Providing context for the papers, I argue that the blurring of boundaries and the fusion of the real and the virtual in hybrid settings may require rethinking conventional ethnographic methods in the future, and beyond that, the actual problem space for anthropology. To frame the papers methodologically, I suggest that we are in a process of experimentation during which conventional ethnographic methods are being adjusted, or will need to be adjusted, to the requirements of a truly hybrid ethnography, i.e., one that combines research in virtual and real-world spaces. I specifically examine some of the issues that arise in and for online and offline research, gauging the impact on core concepts in anthropological ethnography such as "fieldsite" and "participant observation.".
Abstract Questions of bi identities can be invisibilised and overlooked by queer theorizing and LGBT studies. This article explores the ways in which complex performances of bisexuality can simultaneously encompass and deconstructively critique bi identity in a manner which embraces the "and" between bi and queer, offering important insights into how bi is lived, contested and reaffirmed. Drawing on the BiCon and BiFest events in the UK we argue that both the materialities (and supposed fixities) of bi erasures and exclusions, and the fluidities that trouble the heterosexual/homosexual divides, offer key insights into the spatial and temporal fixing and unfixing of identities.
This article argues that in order to cultivate a more thorough understanding of how gender, sexuality and embodiment come to ‘matter’ in digital environments, it is necessary to reconsider the notion of the virtual as it relates to everyday reality, in addition to rethinking the digital in relation to our common conception of materiality. To develop such an understanding, the discussion is organized around three sections. The first section addresses the notion of ‘virtuality’ by arguing that empirical inquiries into new media cultures should expand their conception of the ‘virtual’ beyond its common associations with digitally mediated environments, in order to properly recognize the materiality of everyday digital practices. The second section focuses on how ‘virtual’ performances of gender, sexuality and embodiment become materialized in digital space. Finally, the third section addresses gender performance and embodied memory in relation to the archival properties of internet platforms that feature user-generated content. It is concluded that that the virtual plays a constitutive role in the materialization of gender, sexuality and embodiment in both digital and physical spaces. Rather than approaching digitally virtual images in terms of disembodied information and signification, we should continue to ask how they in-form and are in-formed by the volatile and intractable matter of gender, sexuality and embodiment.
In this reflective essay, the author looks at the changes she has observed over the past 10 years on the subjects she wrote about in previous volumes of the Journal of Bisexuality. These subjects were “Bisexual Personal Ads in UK-based Publications” and “British Women and Bisexuality.” The author concludes that there have been great changes in both, and these have been wrought by the Internet and, in particular, social media. Although some of these changes have been for the worse, the author argues that there have been great gains made too.
The authors are a group of researchers and writers who work on bisexuality, organize bisexual research conferences, and take part in discussions on many bisexual and lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and queer (LGBTQ) academic forums. The authors have noticed, over the years, many problematic tendencies in research that focuses on, or includes, bisexuals. The authors therefore felt that it would be useful to come up with a list of ‘good practice’ guidelines for people researching and writing in this area. These should be particularly useful to those new to the area when they send out their calls for participants, to avoid alienating those participants or finding themselves ‘reinventing the wheel’ with their studies. Hopefully, the guidelines will also be helpful for experienced researchers to reflect on their research practices.
The internet has met with mixed community reactions, especially when the focus is on young people's internet use. There are those who fear that the internet will introduce undesirable people and information into the home, leaving the young vulnerable and exploited. Alternatively, there are others who argue that the exclusion of young people from the internet is one of many examples of the diminishing public space that is made available to young people in this post-modern world. In this article we focus on the internet use of one ‘space deprived’ group of marginalized young people, those who are same-sex attracted. Regardless of some important changes in Australian culture and law, these young people's opportunities to openly live their sexual difference remain restricted. In this article we are interested in exploring the role of the internet as a space in which some important sexuality work can be done. What we found was that the internet was providing young people with the space to practise six different aspects of their sexual lives namely identity, friendship, coming out, intimate relationships, sex and community.
In discourses about gay, lesbian and bisexual identity, and in the models of sexual identity development that emerged in the 1970s and 1980s, coming out is marked as one of the crucial steps in developing a healthy sexual identity. In these discourses, coming out is positioned as `good' as it enables the healthy development of sexual identity, while non-disclosure is positioned as `bad'. As such, there is a disclosure imperative attached to living as gay, lesbian or bisexual. Using empirical evidence gathered from in-depth interviews with 60 Australian bisexual men and women, this article argues that, for bisexuals, the decision about whether to come out is influenced by several factors not often taken into account in sexual identity development models and coming out narratives. These factors make it inherently more difficult to come out to others as bisexual, and significantly challenge the notion of the disclosure imperative.
Is the closet just a metaphor? Closet Space provides a highly original account of the spatial metaphor of "the closet", and is the first geography text to focus on this important issue. Using a variety of research techniques and materials, the book explores the closet through texts including: * the oral histories of gay men in the UK and US * the sexualised landscape of a New Zealand city * the national census of Britain and the US * international travel guides and travelogues and refers to the work of Butler, Lefebvre and Foucault.
This paper explores ways in which the research design of an anonymous online discussion forum on sexual orientation and schooling fostered the creation, maintenance and/or disruption of linguistic constructions of participant identity. The paper focuses on the presentation of self and the performance of sex–gender–sexuality within a research environment carefully designed as a ‘safe space’: an environment in which the body is conspicuous by its absence, and the construction and performance of identity relies on language alone. We explore the lines of power operating firstly between ourselves as researchers and the discussion participants, and secondly between the participants themselves, and consider the particular complexities involved in both creating and researching an online environment where simply to take part is to be at risk, and where the intervention or participation of the researchers may act both as a silencing mechanism and as a source of danger.
Whereas substantial scholarly attention has been paid to the online presentation of self, symbolic interactionist approaches are largely absent in the literature on virtual communities. Instead, recurrent questions are whether communities can exist online and if specific online venues qualify as communities or not. Inspired by symbolic interactionist perspectives on urban settlements, this paper aims to move beyond these dichotomous questions by studying how different meanings attached to an online venue (‘virtual imagery’) can be understood from offline experiences. In a case study of a Dutch forum for orthodox protestant homosexuals two types of understanding of online community emerged from an analysis of 15 in-depth interviews. Users struggling with stigmatization in offline life seek empathic support and have an encompassing sense of online community – the forum is a ‘refuge’. For users dealing with practical everyday questions, online contacts are part of so-called personal communities and help to ameliorate offline life – the forum is a ‘springboard’. Apart from demonstrating that online forums can serve as Goffmanian back-stages in two distinct ways, these results indicate it is fruitful to take a symbolic interactionist approach to uncover relationships between offline and online social life.
What role does blogging play for some bi people who are coming out? What do they write about, and how does and doesn't it help them? Although some of those blogging are able to be, and want to be, interested in joining some kind of real-world bi community, others are neither able nor interested. Yet more want to consider issues of sexuality before they take themselves out to that community. Whichever group they fall into, blogging can help individuals think through the issues involved with, hopefully, the support of some interested readers. This article looks at blogs that are active (at the time of BiReCon), and some have definitely or probably ended to look at how the writers negotiate the coming-out process. It argues that, though blogging can certainly help, it is the role of the reader and commenter on the blog that is key to the beneficial effect that blogs can have.
The aim of the current study was to investigate differences and similarities in participants' use of the Internet for sexually related purposes. An additional goal was to compare heterosexuals, bisexuals, and gay men/lesbians in Sweden regarding the kinds of sexually related activities that they engage in online. Data were collected in 2002 through an online questionnaire from 1,458 respondents who reported that they use the Internet for sexually related purposes. The results suggested bisexuals use the Internet as a resource for information and to interact with people with the same interests and to engage in behaviors that they would not engage in offline. In contrast, gay men and lesbians made use of the Internet more as a tool in their everyday lives, using it more frequently to find offline sex partners and for sexual gratification. By comparison, heterosexuals did not use the Internet for sexual purposes to the same extent as bisexuals or gay men and lesbians. Based upon the results, the authors suggest that greater attention should be paid to sexual orientation in future studies and that failing to acknowledge sexual orientation subgroups as distinct categories might bias research results.
This piece addresses the prevalence of bisexual behavior requested in personal ads in a range of UK publications and examines who is advertising and for what. Through analyzing the ads, and by interviewing some of the people who have used them, I consider how and why people use this method of pursuing recreational sex. I also look at what this tells us about the swing scene and bisexual behavior outside of the politicized bisexual community.
This exploratory study examined Topic threads in Lesbian/Bisexual Groups on MySpace to examine how young biwomen self-identify in online exchanges with other bisexuals and lesbians, as well as what attitudes and beliefs about bisexuality emerge from those exchanges. Four Topic threads from three Groups suggested that young biwomen use social networking sites to connect with others and create inclusive communities for biyouth. Although acceptance of bisexuality was strongly endorsed by many, they were sometimes met with antagonism from their lesbian peers. Together with lesbian allies, they were able to challenge such prejudice but remain keenly aware of its existence.
This reprinted chapter originally appeared in the Journal of Bisexuality, Vol 4(1-2) 2004, 7-23. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record
2005-03558-001.) This study examined how bisexually-identified individuals experience cultural altitudes toward bisexuality, how they establish a sense of community for themselves, and how their experience has affected their self-concept. Twenty self-identified bisexual women and men were interviewed for a descriptive study. The results indicate that cultural attitudes toward bisexuality affect sexual identity development, self-definition, visibility, and relationships. Three steps to establishing a sense of community included: perception of outsider status, location of bisexual individuals and community, and formation of new community. The effects on self-concept of forming and maintaining bisexual identity included: enhanced self-reliance, openness, and enrichment. Both gender and cultural minority status had an impact on the experience of bisexuality. On the basis of the findings, the author proposes a theory of bisexual identity development which includes the following stages: questioning reality, inventing the identity, maintaining the identity, and transforming adversity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
In this article, Professor Kenji Yoshino seeks to explain why the category of bisexuality has been erased in contemporary American political and legal discourse. He first argues that the invisibility of bisexuality relative to homosexuality does not reflect the incidences of those orientations in the population. Defining bisexuality as the possession of more than incidental desire for both sexes, Yoshino shows that the major sexuality studies demonstrate that the incidence of bisexuality is in fact greater than or comparable to the incidence of homosexuality. Yoshino explains the erasure of bisexuality by positing that both self-identified heterosexuals and self-identified homosexuals have overlapping interests in the erasure of bisexuality that lead them into an "epistemic contract" of bisexual erasure. These interests include: (1) the stabilization of exclusive sexual orientation categories; (2) the retention of sex as an important diacritical axis; and (3) the protection of norms of monogamy. Noting that such contracts tend to become visible only when they are challenged, Yoshino describes how bisexuals have increasingly contested their own erasure. Finally, Yoshino examines the effects of bisexual invisibility and visibility in the legal realm, focusing on the sexual harassment jurisprudence of recent decades.
This essay introduces the reader both to the varieties of representations of queers currently available on US Web servers and to the kinds of critical questions that scholars and activists can ask about such representations. As such, the author surveys, summarizes, and analyzes both pertinent Websites and scholarly writing about queer representation, identity, community, and social agency. Ultimately, the author concludes that analyzing queer self-representation on the Web is a significant scholarly undertaking in that it can help us understand better (1) how queers use, represent themselves, and are represented on the Web, and (2) what such representations might mean for our understanding of ourselves, our cultures, and our future both locally and globally.
From introduction: "Daddy is saying `Holy moly!' to his computer again!" "Those words have become a family code for the way my virtual community has infiltrated our real world. My seven-year-old daughter knows that her father congregates with a family of invisible friends who seem to gather in his computer. Sometimes he talks to them, even if nobody else can see them. And she knows that these invisible friends sometimes show up in the flesh, materializing from the next block or the other side of the planet. "Since the summer of 1985, for an average of two hours a day, seven days a week, I've been plugging my personal computer into my telephone and making contact with the WELL (Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link)--a computer conferencing system that enables people around the world to carry on public conversations and exchange private electronic mail (e-mail). The idea of a community accessible only via my computer screen sounded cold to me at first, but I learned quickly that people can feel passionately about e-mail and computer conferences. I've become one of them. I care about these people I met through my computer, and I care deeply about the future of the medium that enables us to assemble. "I'm not alone in this emotional attachment to an apparently bloodless technological ritual. Millions of people on every continent also participate in the computer-mediated social groups known as virtual communities, and this population is growing fast. Finding the WELL was like discovering a cozy little world that had been flourishing without me, hidden within the walls of my house; an entire cast of characters welcomed me to the troupe with great merriment as soon as I found the secret door. Like others who fell into the WELL, I soon discovered that I was audience, performer, and scriptwriter, along with my companions, in an ongoing improvisation. A full-scale subculture was growing on the other side of my telephone jack, and they invited me to help create something new."
Recent years have seen a dramatic upsurge of interest in the connections between sexualities, space and place. Drawing established and 'founding' figures of the field together with emerging authors, this innovative volume offers a broad, interdisciplinary and international overview of the geographies of sexualities. Incorporating a discussion of queer geographies, Geographies of Sexualities engages with cutting edge agendas and challenges the orthodoxies within geography regarding spatialities and sexualities. It contains original and previously unpublished material that spans the often separated areas of theory, practices and politics. This innovative volume offers a trans-disciplinary engagement with the spatialities of sexualities, intersecting discussions of sexualities with issues such as development, race, gender and other forms of social difference. © Kath Browne, Jason Lim and Gavin Brown 2007. All rights reserved.
The Bisexual Report: Bisexual inclusion in LGBT equality and diversity
- M. Barker
- C. Richards
- R. Jones
- H. Bowes-Catton
- T. Plowman
- J. Yockney
- M. Morgan
The Margins of the City: Gay Men's Urban Lives
- D. Bell
Biseksualiteit 10 Keer Vraag en Antwoord. Available at <<https://www.movisie.nl/sites/default/files/alfresco_files/Handreiking-Biseksualiteit-10-keer-vraag-en-antwoord%20[MOV-6497303-1.0].pdf>> Accessed on 6 October 2016.
- H. Felten
- E. Maliepaard
Bi People Additional Findings Report December 2008. Available at <<http://www.countmeintoo.co.uk/academic_reports.php>> Accessed on 6 October 2016.
- K. Browne
- J. Lim
Activating Theory: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Politics
- J. Eadie
Developing Survey Questions on Sexual Identity: Exploratory Focus Groups. Available at <<http://www.ons.gov.uk/about-statistics/measuringequality/sexual-identityproject/sexual-identity-focus-group-report.pdf>> Accessed on 6 October 2016.
- P. Betts
- A. Wilmot
- T. Taylor
Queers in Space: Communities, Public Spaces, Sites of Resistance
- C. Hemmings