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Healing the Land and the People: Responding to Contemporary Challenges via Food Sovereignty, Coalition Building, and Indigenous Knowledge Q&A
No full textConstruction of Non-Binary Identities in Narrative Discourse
No full textThis study examines the discursive construction and performance of non-binary identities in the context of lived experience narratives. It uses a broad thematic analysis (Bradford et al. 2019) to contextualise and enrich discursive analysis (Corwin 2009) into how participants manipulate the semiotics (Silverstein 2003; Jaffe 2016; Gal 2016) of implicitly and explicitly gendered lexicon (following Zimman 2014; Zimman 2017a). Results show that this allowed participants to legitimise their self-identification by separating identity and embodiment (Zimman 2017a), and to create a non-binary inclusive ideology able to legitimise the experiencing and expression of their identities (Corwin 2009; Darwin 2017). The analysis further revealed how the discursive construction of non-binary identities was informed by the complex interaction of gender, embodiment, and sexuality (Connel 1995; Cameron 1998; Kiesling 2002; Eckert 2011; Zimman 2013). In showing how these identities were related through multiple instances of iconisation and indexicality (Gal 2016; Jaffe 2016), this analysis showed how they are constituted and interrelated in normative gender ideology more broadly (West & Zimmerman 1987, 2009; Butler 1993). Therefore, it is shown that in discursively constructing and performing their non-binary identities, participants engaged with this normative gender ideology and ultimately sought to emphasize individuality and personhood against the restrictions of binary gender. Thus, this study contributes to the literature examining how non-binary identities are discursively constructed and performed, but also offers crucial insights into the constitution of normative gender ideology and its relation to embodiment and sexuality. It concludes that this shows the need for more research within a sociocultural linguistics framework (Bucholtz & Hall 2016), where embodiment and the physical body are seen as central to the production, perception and social interpretation of language
Looking for Truth in All the Right Places: Bodies as Texts in the Erotic Poetries of Carlos Drummond de Andrade and Ronaldo Wilson
No full textWhat surfaces when we align contemporary raw U.S. homoerotic poetry with shy late 20th-century Brazilian hetero-erotic poetry? In erotic poetry, inner and outer worlds frequently converge on the body to create new landscapes ripe with expression. If sexuality is vital to the process of identity-making, then the language of erotic poetry is a site of creation. In this paper, I examine the liminality explored in the erotic poetry of the late Brazilian poet, Carlos Drummond de Andrade and the contemporary Black gay poet, Ronaldo Wilson. Specifically, I trace each poetic quest for truth through the acts of transgression, linguistic and sexual, as it relates to identity-making. In writing the erotic, each poet inverts high culture to open up conversations about wonder, shame and nostalgia with the body as a stage. Drawing from Bakhtin\u27s concepts of translinguistics and the carnivalesque, I perform a textual analysis on selected erotic poems of Drummond and Wilson to highlight the relationship between narrative and transgression. I compare the use of bodies and their fluids as a vehicle for continuous identity construction through rejection, repurposing and/or renewal of the self in poetry. By cross-temporally juxtaposing two distinct literary voices whose erotic poems intersect on the liminal space of the body, I show how the transgressive spirit of erotic poetry can be a fruitful and queer space apt for articulating ideas about language, class, race, sexuality and gender
Attraction, desire and permanency: constructing asexual identities via definition and negotiation
No full textIn this paper, I will report on some findings drawn from my ethnographic research project on asexual identity construction within the Asexual Visibility and Education Network (AVEN) forums. Using data collected from forum posts and an online survey of forum members, this presentation will focus on the contentious issue of how asexuality is defined and will consider the ways in which individuals within the AVEN community negotiate a place for themselves in relation to common definitions.
My research has found that AVEN members have defined asexuality in a number of different ways but that some common patterns exist amongst these definitions. I have therefore used discourse analysis and corpus techniques to investigate the linguistic constructions of these definitions, with attention paid to concepts of sexual orientation, attraction and desire; the direction and objects of attraction; and the totality and permanence of a lack of desire. Focusing on such themes has helped to show which elements are most important to the understandings that AVEN members have of asexuality and to ascertaining the extent to which members may be willing or unwilling to adjust their understandings in order to admit others under the asexual umbrella.
This paper will give consideration to the issue of defining asexuality and will also look at AVEN as a community of practice in which members educate each other on what it means to be asexual and construct a collective asexual identity via enforcing and conceding their own definitions. This presentation will therefore show that processes of negotiation are key to AVEN functioning as a community of practice and to constructing an asexual identity that is specific to the context of the AVEN forums and its current membership
Queer speakers and gendered language: A new linguistic gender typology
No full textThe primary motivation behind queer gendered language reform proposals over the past several decades has remained the same: social gender can be grammaticalized, and for many speakers, this presents a problem (Wittig, 1985). Where gendered distinctions appear in the grammar, they are usually binary and leave little or no opportunity to express gender-neutrality or gender-inclusivity unless speakers create an innovative form of personal reference. Yet even for masculine-feminine morphological (or grammatical) gender, perhaps the most obvious example of this phenomenon, many linguists still argue that linguistic gender is unrelated to social gender, even where people are referenced. While we are now beginning to understand how the possibility of expressing gender-inclusivity can be created in gendered languages (e.g. latinx, elle \u27they [sg.]\u27 in Spanish; Acosta Matos, 2016, iel \u27they [sg.]\u27 in French; Knisley, 2020), current definitions of linguistic gender fail to address its complex interconnection with social gender and the other gendered features of language (e.g. personal pronouns, lexical gender) which are excluded from descriptions of morphological gender. This paper explores a new linguistic gender typology—one that takes as starting point queer speakers’ identifications of grammatical distinctions based on social gender—in order to ground the issue of gender in language with relation to gender self-identification, isolating those systems which have linguistic gender distinctions based on social gender from those which do not. Special focus is placed on typologically dissimilar languages—for instance Mandarin Chinese, wherein feminine gender can be marked with its own radical (e.g. 她 \u27she\u27)—to decenter the study of Western languages and cultures through this approach. In this way, evidence that some linguistic gender is at least partially related to social gender, provided by nonbinary and other queer speakers who have innovated nonbinary forms of personal reference, may be incorporated into a new theory which contends that social gender categories may become encoded into language, and that these are not closed categories. The establishment of such a theory seeks to systematize research on nonbinary gender in language and assert the humanity of the issue and its critical importance to gender-nonconforming speakers
From Language to Algorithm: Transphobia in Research on Gender Recognition Software
No full textWithin the North American blogosphere, LGBTQ+ scholars and activists are mounting vocal criticism of the technological drive towards ever more detailed applications of facial recognition and gender identification software (Gault, 2019; Gutierrez, 2019; Hay, 2019; Johnson, 2019; Merlan & Mehrotra, 2019; Samuel, 2019). Much of that critical attention is driven by a small number of scholars in studies of technology and human-computer interaction who challenge the underlying conceptions of gender which inform such software (Hamidi, Scheuerman, & Branham, 2018; Kannabiran & Petersen, 2010; Rode, 2011). Such work has explored the history of algorithmic bias against trans identities (Hicks, 2019), the experiences and strategies trans people use when navigating prescriptive gender norms of technological systems (Ahmed, 2018), and the risks for trans lives that are created by binary and immutable conceptions of gender recognition algorithms (Keyes, 2018). The fact that commercial development of facial recognition software interacts with research practices presents the language employed in research publications as an avenue for examining the presence of trans-inclusive language and trans-competent research design in the development of gender recognition software. Our project investigates the language of facial recognition research publications which mention non-binary gender, gender non-conformity, and gender transition in some way. We are interested in how choices of phrases and citations do or do not draw on trans experience and trans voices, or do or do not link lto scholarship on gender and trans identity (Thieme & Saunders, 2018). For our analysis, we have collected via database searches a corpus of 15 conference and research articles published between 2010 to 2019; we conduct a content analysis with a basic scheme for coding. Given the overwhelming assumptions of binary and immutable conceptions of gender which have been shown to lie at the heart of most technological work on gender recognition (Keyes, 2018), we ask: how do trans, non-binary, or genderfluid identities figure in the research discourse that does mention gender outside an exclusively binary or immutable conception of gender? And how are practices of citation used to characterize the landscape of existing research that is presented as relevant to projects of gender recognition
Examining Phonetic Trends in the Speech of Transgender YouTubers
No full textThis study is a phonetic analysis of transgender English speaking YouTubers. It is primarily exploratory and is being used as a pilot study for further research into trends in transgender speech. This study focuses on three values: fundamental frequency (F0), vowel space, and sibilants. Seven videos of transgender YouTubers were selected where they discuss topics related to transition or experiences as a transperson. Each video was transcribed and force aligned using DARLA producing a TextGrid, enabling phonetic analysis in Praat. Measurements were taken for each value, which were then used to compare speakers within each group as well as with cisgender speakers of English. F0 is perceptually identified by listeners as pitch, which is an easily identifiable quality of speech. F0 for four peripheral vowels in English (/i/, /æ/, /u/, and /a/) were measured at the midpoint of the vowel. Overall range and mean for F0 were found. When compared with cisgender speakers, all transgender speakers fell well within the ranges of their cisgender counterparts for mean F0. F0 range was larger for transwomen, which parallels what is seen in cisgender women. Vowel space was measured impressionistically using vowel plots rather than using statistical model (some statistical modeling has been done since this study). Overall, the transwomen show an expanded vowel space when compared with the transmen who show a more contracted space. The data was not normalized in any way and comparison to cisgender speakers was not done. Sibilants were examined using two metrics. As duration was indicated by some research as being a useful indicated of gender and sexuality, it was sampled for each speaker. Differences in duration with respect to either group was not borne out in the data. Spectral mean was also measured for each group. The transwomen showed ranges and trends similar to cisgender women. Transgender men were more variable in their production of sibilants. As a whole, this study shows that for several metrics, transgender men and women have values that align with cisgender members of their respective genders when examined through trends seen in F0, vowel space, and sibilant measures
But \u27we\u27 who? : Negotiation of belonging through problematized collective self-reference
No full textPrior work on identity and belonging across disciplines has highlighted the different ways in which belonging is materialized in practice (Brubaker & Cooper 2000; Yuval-Davis 2010). In the present paper I investigate individual perceptions and experiences of belonging as evidenced in discursive constructions of groupness. More specifically, I focus on the ways in which non-heterosexual Greek individuals understand and experience their belonging to a perceived ‘Greek LGBT community’. Data are drawn from eight focus groups with 25 Greek LGBT individuals regarding issues of sexual citizenship in Greece, politics, religion, and family. During the conversation, participants used a series of strategies of self-positioning and stance-taking; among them, they systematically claimed membership to a variety of different – often overlapping – social categories. Adopting a conversation analytic perspective, I look at the use of collective selfreference (‘we’) and the ways in which its referential fluidity is managed in language (e.g. through constructions such as ‘we’ + noun/attribute/place-reference etc.). I particularly focus on occurrences of collective self-reference in problematic turns (e.g. delayed completion and pauses, see Schegloff 2007). In such cases, the interlocutors problematize either the referent of ‘we’, or the extent to which they themselves feel (or even qualify to be) part of it. Through this local negotiation of meaning, participants (re/de)construct the idea of a (Greek LGBT) community, and actively negotiate the extent of their membership to it. I argue that problematization of collective self-reference emerges as a strategy for the interlocutors to position themselves in relation to others, to take stances regarding their experience of belonging, and to actively make sense of their intersectional lived experience (Levon 2015) in talk
Community forum: welcome and overview
No full textThe online community forum is a virtual place for connection and continued discussion of the conference themes. All registered attendees are invited and encouraged to attend.
The welcoming forum on 3/15 will be a Meet + Greet and will also include an overview of the schedule and presenters at the 2021 Religion & Ecology Summit