Queering Straight Teachers

Much of the focus of anti-homophobic/anti-heterosexist educational theory, curriculum, and pedagogy has examined the impact of homophobia and heterosexism on gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (GLBT) students and teachers. Such a focus has provided numerous theoretical and pedagogical insights, and has informed important changes in educational policy. Queering Straight Teachers: Discourse and Identity in Education remains deeply committed to the social justice project of improving the lives of GLBT students and teachers. However, in contrast with much of the previous scholarship, Queering Straight Teachers shifts the focus from an analysis of the GLBT «Other» to a critical examination of what it might mean, in theory and in practice, to queer straight teachers, and the implications this has for challenging institutionalized heteronormativity in education. This book will be useful in courses on educational foundations, curriculum studies, multicultural education, queer theory, gay and lesbian studies, and critical theory.

"How do gay and lesbian teachers grapple with their professional and sexual identities at work, given that these identities are constructed as mutually exclusive, even indeed as mutually opposed? Using rich interview and ethnographic materials from Texas and California, School's Out explores how teachers struggle to create a classroom persona that balances who they are and what's expected of them in a climate of pervasive homophobia. Catherine Connell takes readers into the private and professional lives of gay and lesbian educators, along the way developing the innovative concept of racialized homophobia, which thwarts challenges to sexual injustices in schools. She also uses her own experiences as one point of intersection with the ideas in this volume. Connell's exploration of the tension between the rhetoric of gay pride and the professional ethic of discretion insightfully connects and considers other complicating factors, from local law and politics to race and gender privilege. With a sense of ethnographic verve and an engaging authorial presence, School's Out is essential reading for specialists and students of queer studies, gender studies, and educational politics."--Provided by publisher.

Theoretical studies in curriculum have begun to move into cultural studies--one vibrant and increasingly visible sector of which is queer theory. Queer Theory in Education brings together the most prominent and promising scholars in the field of education--primarily but not exclusively in curriculum--in the first volume on queer theory in education. In his perceptive introduction, the editor outlines queer theory as it is emerging in the field of education, its significance for all scholars and teachers, and its relation to queer theory in literacy theory and more generally, in the humanities.

Queering Elementary Education is not about teaching kids to be gay, lesbian, bisexual, or straight. ItOs not part of a sinister stratagem in the Ogay agenda.O Instead, these provocative and thoughtful essays advocate the creation of classrooms that challenge categorical thinking, promote interpersonal intelligence, and foster critical consciousness. Queer elementary classrooms are those where parents and educators care enough about their children to trust the human capacity for understanding and their educative abilities to foster insight into the human condition. Those who teach queerly refuse to participate in the great sexual sorting machine called schooling where diminutive GI Joes and Barbies become star quarterbacks and prom queens, while the Linuses and Tinky Winkies become wallflowers or human doormats. Queeering education means bracketing our simplest classroom activities in which we routinely equate sexual identities with sexual acts, privilege the heterosexual condition, and presume sexual destinies. Queer teachers are those who develop curriculum and pedagogy that afford every child dignity rooted in self-worth and esteem for others. In short, queering education happens when we look at schooling upside down and view childhood from the inside out. This groundbreaking volume demands we explore taken-for-granted assumptions about diversity, identities, childhood, and prejudice.

This book argues that issues of sexual diversity are inextricably interwoven into the basic concerns of pre-service teacher education. How do we make our students aware of assumptions regarding masculinity, femininity, and sexuality that arise from what is presented, represented, or omitted from curricula and classroom practice? What do we say about homophobia and heterosexism as we anticipate the administrative hierarchies, school cultures, parent and community politics they will encounter as teachers? What special challenges might face a teacher (straight or gay) who discusses sexual orientation in a high school classroom, or responds to a homophobic remark in the hallway or the cafeteria? How should we prepare a teacher for a parent conference with two moms or two dads? The essays in this volume range from an analysis of gay stereotypes in teacher education textbooks, to a discussion of queer multiculturalism, to personal accounts by lesbian and gay teacher educators and heterosexual allies who are challenging homophobia and heterosexism in their own classrooms and programs. All agree that education for sexual diversity is as important as education about all other forms of difference, and that future teachers need to know how to create safe spaces for lesbian and gay students, along with the children of gay families who are increasingly a part of the classroom landscape.

Twenty completely new stories of negotiating the triumphs and challenges of being an LGBT educator in the twenty-first century For more than twenty years, the One Teacher in Ten series has served as an invaluable source of strength and inspiration for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender educators. This all-new edition brings together stories from across America—and around the world—resulting in a rich tapestry of varied experiences. From a teacher who feels he must remain closeted in the comparative safety of New York City public schools to teachers who are out in places as far afield as South Africa and China, the teachers and school administrators in One Teacher in Ten in the New Millennium prove that LGBT educators are as diverse and complex as humanity itself. Voices largely absent from the first two editions—including transgender people, people of color, teachers working in rural districts, and educators from outside the United States—feature prominently in this new collection, providing a fuller and deeper understanding of the triumphs and challenges of being an LGBT teacher today.

In a set of compelling letters to teachers, Tara Goldstein addresses a full range of issues facing lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) students and families at elementary and secondary school. Goldstein talks to teachers about how they can support LGBTQ students and families by normalizing LGBTQ lives in the curriculum, challenging homophobic and transphobic ideas, and building an inclusive school culture that both expects and welcomes LGBTQ students and their families. Moving and energizing, Teaching Gender and Sexuality at School provides readers with the knowledge and resources they need to create safer and more positive classrooms and discusses what it takes to build authentic, trusting relationships with LGBTQ students and families.Includes "The Unicorn Glossary" by benjamin lee hicks, the performed ethnography Snakes and Ladders by Tara Goldstein, and the verbatim play Out at School by Tara Goldstein, Jenny Salisbury, and Pam Baer.

What do we mean when we talk about 'queer teachers'? The authors here grapple with what it means to be sexually or gender diverse and to work as a school teacher within four national contexts: Australia, Ireland, the UK and the USA. This new volume offers academics, educators and students a provocative exploration of this pivotal topic.