Drawing on a larger year-long ethnography at a public, urban, comprehensive high school in the Midwestern United States, this article describes the texts students composed in a co-taught sophomore (grade 10) humanities course combining social studies and English language arts. Bringing together sociocultural perspectives on literacy and…

Drawing on ethnographic research in an urban high school in the USA, this article highlights how schooling structures and practices produce and reinforce an ideology of heteronormative binary gender. The construction of gender and sexuality occurs in systematic ways, shaped through structural forces and mapped onto social spaces and bodies. Yet,…

The nature of sex/ualities, genders and schooling has changed considerably over the last 20 years, with global political, social and cultural shifts bringing the lives of queer youth to the fore. Trans youth are now more visible and various kinds of support groups in schools (such as diversity support groups, queer groups and gay-straight…

Purpose: This article explores different strands of educational discourse about sexual diversity in Portuguese schools, from the students' perspectives. Method: The methodological approach consisted in conducting focus groups discussions: 36 with 232 young students (H = 106, M = 126) in 12 public secondary schools. Findings: Students reveal a…

In this article, I examine the relationship between large-scale social discourses and local, school discourses as it plays out in conversations about gender and sexuality with and among teachers, specifically in the context of the passage of the Fair, Accurate, Inclusive, and Respectful (FAIR) Education Act in California. Grounded in feminist…

This paper examines the work of a gay-straight alliance and the ways in which members use elements of queer theory to understand their own and others' identities, both to make sense of their experiences and to support their activist efforts. The analysis identifies queer perspectives on gender and sexual identity as useful tools for supporting…

Drawing on an ethnographic case study of a 13-week Gay and Lesbian Literature course, this paper explores how a high-school teacher and her students engaged with queer-themed literature. Focused on episodes around the class' engagement with two of the novels read in the course--Rita Mae Brown's "Rubyfruit Jungle" and Michael Cunningham's…

The concept of space is gaining increased attention in studies of sexuality and gender, not least those focusing on heterosexism and heteronormativity. Such studies have demonstrated that space is sexualised, gendered and actively produced. In this article, we present the findings from an ethnographic study of two Icelandic upper secondary…

Educational institutions, like most social service organizations, need to recognize intersectionality and complexity and move away from monolithic conceptions of homelessness--if they recognize homelessness at all. This first person account of a gay, Cambodian refugee illustrates the enormous complexity schools face in forming institutional…

This article investigates the prevailing social inertia of vocational training. Previous research indicates that gendered social norms contribute to sustaining gender segregation. Few studies, however, have paid attention to how the interplay of emotional and material factors impact on gender norms in vocational training. The article builds on an…

In this paper, we study how Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender people (LGBT) students in Icelandic upper secondary schools interpret their experience of heteronormative environment and how they respond to it. The aim is to explore how sexualities and gendered bodies are constructed through "schooling". The article draws on interview…

This article offers insights on how students experienced and made sense of their learning in a trimester-long high school Gay and Lesbian Literature course. Drawing on questionnaires and interviews that the students completed as part of a larger ethnographic study of this class, the author shows how a queer-themed literature curriculum is relevant…

This study was concerned with an examination of the heteropatriarchy as it was performed by six self-identified heterosexual male English teachers and two high school administrators in the United States and Canada. These educators explained their efforts regarding their own thinking about identity and curriculum and their attempts to teach a…

Purpose: Previous research examining the experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and queer (LGBTQ) youth in schools suggests that schools are not inclusive places for non-heterosexual students. Some scholars, however, suggest that a continued focus on how these young people are marginalised is itself a problem, and that research should also…

Using an ecological model, the individual-, school-, and sociocultural-level characteristics that affect gay-straight alliance (GSA) advisors were examined in the current study. The formation of GSAs has been one way that schools have sought to improve the school climate for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) youth. Limited information…