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Unsettled Relations: Schools, Gay Marriage, and Educating for Sexuality
Author(s) -
Mayo Cris
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
educational theory
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.21
H-Index - 42
eISSN - 1741-5446
pISSN - 0013-2004
DOI - 10.1111/edth.12040
Subject(s) - human sexuality , gender studies , sociology , identity (music) , homosexuality , diversity (politics) , sexual identity , curriculum , politics , sexuality education , sex education , political science , law , pedagogy , anthropology , physics , acoustics
In this article, Cris Mayo examines the relationship among anti‐ LGBTQ policies, gay marriage, and sexuality education. Her concern is that because gay marriage is insufficiently different from heterosexual marriage, adding it as an issue to curriculum or broader culture debate elides rather than addresses sexual difference. In other words, marriage may be an assimilative aspiration that closes down discussions of what sexuality is and can mean, that sidesteps other related social issues such as health care for all, and that reinforces sexuality and gender identity as privatized, not political, concerns. Mayo examines different strands of LGBTQ history that complicate the meanings of sexuality and that critique a variety of antigay or heterosexist policies for their exclusions. She concludes by suggesting that the possibilities of sexuality are not served by advocacy for one gay relationship formation and calling for a sexuality education that is instead directed at sexual diversity.