Queer joy-centered sexuality education: offering a novel framework for gender-based violence prevention
Faculty Advisor
Date
2024
Keywords
2SLGBTQ+ youth, sexuality education, consent, gender-based violence, queer joy
Abstract (summary)
2SLGBTQ+ people face disproportionately high rates of gender-based violence (GBV) compared to cisgender heterosexual people. Scholars have predominantly responded to this violence by reporting on victimization, which homogenizes queer and trans life as misery. To avoid reproducing this joy-deficit, we propose a novel approach that centers queer sexual joy. As rape culture is symptomatic of cisheteronormativity, queer sexual joy is a useful analytic with which to subvert GBV. Drawing on findings from the Queer Sexual Joy project, a mixed-methods study involving 100 young adults from Canada and the US, we introduce six recommendations for a framework to focalize queer and trans sexual joy in GBV prevention education, including: 1) containers for safety; 2) communication strategies; 3) bodily autonomy; 4) trauma-informed, anti-oppression, 5) pleasure; and 6) dissociation and grounding practices. We propose that GBV education rooted in queer sexual joy would reorient all youth from hegemonic sexual scripts and provide a frame for more just sexual cultures.
Publication Information
Wright, J., Falek, J., & Greenberg, E. (2024). Queer joy-centered sexuality education: Offering a novel framework for gender-based violence prevention. International Journal of LGBTQ+ Youth Studies, 1–23. https://doi.org/10.1080/19361653.2024.2372296
Notes
Item Type
Article
Language
Rights
All Rights Reserved