Polarising Sexualities and Genders

Divisions, Differences and LGBTQIA+ Equalities

Kath Browne (Anthology Editor) , Emily Kazyak (Anthology Editor)

Open Access

Polarising Sexualities and Genders

Divisions, Differences and LGBTQIA+ Equalities

Kath Browne (Anthology Editor) , Emily Kazyak (Anthology Editor)

Open Access

Paperback ~~$43.95~~ $39.55 Hardback ~~$131.50~~ $118.35

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Description

This ground-breaking open access collection tackles polarisations around sexualities and genders and in doing so, it opens out debates and discussions to reflect on how people live them, including and moving beyond social movements and political debates.

Anti-gender and heteroactivist movements have become increasingly recognized as key political groups in the last decade, driving resistances that often respond to LGBTQI+ inclusion. How these divisions are felt and experienced is under-explored.

Crossing a variety of geographical contexts, including India, USA, Canada, Ireland, and Great Britain, Polarising Sexualities and Genders brings together leading and emerging scholars in multiple disciplines to explore, theorise and hope for change in social, legal, and political sexual/gendered/LGBTQIA+ landscapes. Examples include polarisation in media coverage and legislative debates about gender and transgender rights in the US and UK, to the possibility of occupying a sexual borderlands, the changing language for LGBTQIA+identities within the US, and the ways in which new discourses emerge to capture sexual lives. Through these case studies, the book explores how polarizing discourses and sociopolitical landscape shape the lived experiences, divisions, and marginalizations among LGBTQIA+ people in places including Lithuania, South India and the southern United States.

The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by the European Research Council.

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
About the Authors
Chapter 1: Introduction - Kath Browne (University College Dublin, Ireland) and Emily Kazyak (University of Nebraska-Lincoln, United States)
Chapter 2: Talking Past Each Other: Political Polarization and Transgender Athlete Bans - Elizabeth Rahilly (Georgia Southern University, United States) and Kimberly Martin (Georgia Southern University, United States)
Chapter 3: Incommensurable Realities: LGBTQ Bodies and the Construction of Religion, Sexuality, and Discrimination in U.S. Federal Religious Exemption Litigation - Emily Kazyak
Chapter 4: Claiming Space in the Margins: Community Organizations as Liminal Spaces for Black Transgender Women Navigating Political Polarization in the U.S. South - Kimya Loder (Georgia Institute of Technology, United States)
Chapter 5: We Are Just Like Everybody Else: Polarisation and Queer activism in Lithuania - Rasa Kamarauskaite (SSEES, UCL, UK)
Chapter 6: Queer Legal Geographies of Polarisation in International LGBTQ Rights Law - Kay Lalor, (Manchester Metropolitan University, UK)
Chapter 7: Uneasy Alliances: Organizing Across Difference to Resist Anti-Trans Legislation - Erika Slaymaker
Chapter 8: Identity Work in the Hubristic Present:How Generations as Groupism Create Polarization - S.L. Crawley (University of South Florida, United States)
Chapter 9: 'Gender Debate' Discourse: Polarising, bigoted and validating - Elizabeth Peel (Loughborough University, UK)
Chapter 10: Misinformation in the 'Gender Wars' in Britain: Affective Attachments in the Use and Misuse of Evidence - Sarah Lamble (Birkbeck, University of London, UK)
Chapter 11: Navigating the Tensions of Creativity and Division: Planning an Artist-led Workshop to Address Polarizations around Sexualities/Genders/Abortion - Carol Ballantine (University College Dublin, Ireland), Leah Hilliard (National College of Art and Design, Dublin, Ireland), and Kath Browne
Chapter 12: Crumbled Worlds or Imperfect Utopias: Discussing Our Polarised Sexual and Gendered Lives - Andrew McCartan (University College Dublin, Ireland), Jody Moore-Ponce (University College Cork (UCC), Ireland), Ann Burke (South East Technological University (SETU) in Ireland), Sarah Foudy, Eliza Thor
References
Index

Product details

Published	Oct 02 2025
Format	Paperback
Edition	1st
Extent	248
ISBN	9781350449855
Imprint	Bloomsbury Academic
Dimensions	234 x 156 mm
Publisher	Bloomsbury Publishing

Anthology Editor

Kath Browne

Kath Browne is a Professor of Geography University…

Anthology Editor

Emily Kazyak

Emily Kazyak is Professor of Sociology and Women’s…

This wonderfully thoughtful and engaging book addresses the complexities of polarisation within contemporary gender and sexual politics. With contributions from leading scholars, it avoids easy conclusions, and sparkles. An important contribution to current debates.

Davina Cooper, King's College London, UK
This volume provides a valuable overview of thinking and research about forms of polarization related to LGBTQIA+ lives and movements. It challenges readers to consider the nature of such polarization and indeed to examine the utility and meaning of the concept of polarization as applied to LGBTQIA+ issues. Taken together, the chapters traverse time periods from the late 20th century to the present and a range of geographic locations, giving consideration to forms of polarization within LGBTQIA+ communities as well as more familiar divisions between advocates and opponents of LGBTQIA+ rights. The book demonstrates how polarization related to LGBTQIA+ issues does not always map neatly onto existing left/right political divisions.

Kathleen E. Hull, University of Minnesota, USA