In this autoethnography I present three narratives exploring how I understood and experienced my identity as a gay beginning teacher working in a rural Australian secondary school, where my sexuality was generally not accepted. Reading these narratives through a phenomenological lens highlights how my subjectivity as a gay man was entangled in my…

Homophobic name-calling is one of the most common forms of gender-based violence that occurs among young people at school. Yet students are reluctant to seek teacher help when homophobic bullying occurs. We investigated what enables bystanders to seek help from teachers when they witness the homophobic harassment of a peer who may be unwilling to…

There have been few attempts to capture the experiences of lesbian-parented families in Australian early childhood settings. This study explored the experiences of such families since the implementation of the first national Early Years Learning Framework in 2009 by way of an online survey and follow-up interviews that were analyzed taking a queer…

LGBTIQ children and adolescents experience disproportionate levels of bullying. "Safe Schools," an Australian anti-bullying program, has recently been a site of public debate, with parents and their imagined concerns being central to the debate. This study investigated how parents construct gender, sexuality, and bullying, in relation to…

This paper represents our collective engagements and productive struggles with queer pedagogical-methodological (im)possibilities across a constellation of educational contexts. Following in the footsteps of queer theorists-pedagogues before us, we approach queerness as a horizon, a unique opportunity to experiment, take risks, explore new forms…

Lesbian parents shared their experiences of using Early Childhood settings in Australia. Aspects discussed included disclosure decisions, the usefulness of children's books featuring same sex parented families, and experiences related to their family composition. Via an online survey and two follow up interviews, these parents explained how…

This article explores findings from an investigation into the publishing experiences of Australian authors of inclusive Young Adult (YA) fiction. A total of seven authors, each publicly identifying as part of a marginalised community in Australia, were interviewed. This paper concentrates on the findings of semi-structured interviews with two…

There is a well-documented absence of inclusive school-based sex and relationships education (SRE) for Australian lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) youth. Moreover, relatively few studies specifically examine how bisexual and queer-identifying young Australian women experience SRE. This qualitative study addresses the gap and…

The furore has recently dissipated, however the 'Safe Schools' behemoth, generated and perpetuated by Australian parliamentarians, looms still as one of the most significant education debates in past years. The following paper draws on 18,000 words spoken about 'Safe Schools' in the Australian Federal Parliament from November 2015 to August 2016.…

In this paper we report the results of an analysis underpinned by a critical orientation seeking non-heteronormative representations of sexualities in an official English curriculum text list. Content and thematic analyses were conducted to establish the extent to which diverse sexualities are represented in the 'sample text list' for the…

Many primary, secondary and tertiary educators need support to engage in inclusive pedagogical practices that challenge homophobia, transphobia and heteronormativity. We present a border-crossing pedagogy (BCP) designed to assist English language arts educators in translating knowledge into action to demolish deeply engrained anti-lesbian, gay,…

This paper explores how young people of diverse genders and sexualities share information about sex, sexualities and genders. Formal approaches to education often fail to consider young people's communication and information exchange practices, including the circulation of peer knowledge through social media. In the wake of recent Australian…

This paper explores LGBTIQ+ students' experiences of knowing, performing and holding queerness in a tertiary educational environment. Through interviews conducted with LGBTIQ+ students at a large Australian metropolitan university, we examine the students' engagement with other LGBTIQ+ students in the tertiary educational space. Although…

Discrimination against LGBT individuals remains widespread across Australia. Since schools continue to promote regimes of heterosexuality and cis-normativity, teachers have a crucial role in creating contexts in which LGBT young people feel accepted and safe. Drawing on North's (2006) work on social justice and Connell's (2012) discussion of…

Young people may face conflicting and confusing messages about what it means to respond well in relation to homophobia and transphobia. Consequently, we ask--What might it mean to respond well to homophobia and transphobia? This strategy, inspired by Anika Thiem and Judith Butler, is recognition of the ambivalent conditions which structure…