1,721,087 research outputs found
Urban encounters and sexual health among gay and bisexual immigrant men: perspectives from the settlement and AIDS service sectors
No full textGay men’s health researchers in North America have recently attended to sexual and mental health issues affecting ethnic minority men, many of whom are also immigrants. Most of this work is grounded in epidemiological models that focus on relationships between individual HIV risk and sexual behaviors. Consequently, they the frame the sexual health of gay and bisexual immigrants as the product of cultural issues(for example,family and religious homophobia, lack of health education) or gay community issues(prevalence of drug use and casual sex) that lead to self-devaluation, depression, and unprotected sex with multiple partners. Few studies, however, examine these phenomena through the lens of migration and resettlement. Using the narratives from twelve in-depth interviews with settlement and AIDS Service Organization (ASO) workers in Toronto, Ottawa, and London, Ontario, Canada, this article examines four types of post-migration urban encounters that influence sexual health: negotiations of resettlement-related stress, encounters with the urban gay community, encounters with the online gay community, and encounters with sexual health promotion itself. The findings suggest that these encounters are important intervening events that mediate the relationship between the attributes of the immigrant and his sexual health behaviors and outcomes
HIV risk behaviours among immigrant and ethnic minority gay and bisexual men in North America and Europe: A systematic review
No full textHIV surveillance systems show that gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) bear a disproportionate burden of HIV in North American and European countries. Within the MSM category, HIV prevalence is often elevated among ethnic minority (i.e., Latino, Asian, and Black) MSM, many of whom are also foreign-born immigrants. Few studies have focused specifically on foreign-born populations, though those that provide data on the nativity of their samples offer an opportunity to investigate the potential role of transnational migration in informing HIV risk among ethnic minority MSM. This systematic review of ethnic minority MSM studies where the nativity of the sample is known provides a robust alternative to single studies measuring individual-level predictors of HIV risk behaviour. In this review, HIV prevalence, unprotected sex, drug use, and HIV testing are analysed in relation to the ethnicity, nativity, and location of the samples included. The results, which include high rates of HIV, unprotected sex, and stimulant use in foreign-born Latino samples and high rates of alcohol and club drug use in majority foreign-born Asian Pacific Islander (API) samples, provide baseline evidence for the theory of migration and HIV risk as syndemics within ethnic minority populations in North American and European countries. The findings also suggest that further research on the contextual factors influencing HIV risk among ethnic minority MSM groups and especially immigrants within these groups is needed. These factors include ethnic networks, individual post-migration transitions, and the gay communities and substance use cultures in specific destination cities. Further comparative work may also reveal how risk pathways differ across ethnic group
Canaries in the mine? Gay community, consumption and aspiration in neoliberal Washington, DC
No full textGay men have been implicated in neoliberal urban development strategies (e.g. the creative city) as a ‘canary’ population that forecasts growth. Paradoxically, both neoliberal re-development of North American inner-cities and the ways in which gay men become neoliberalised as individuals contribute to the dissolution of urban gay communities. In contrast to discourses of homonormativity, which suggest that gay men’s declining attachments to gay communities stem from new equalities and consequent desires to assimilate into the mainstream, this article argues that gay men in DC have internalised neoliberal discourses that call for career development, home ownership and social hypermobilities. The narratives of 24 gay-identified men living in DC indicate that the social and spatial dissolution of the gay community is linked with individual aspirations that are increasingly difficult to achieve. These aspirations include career advancement in a transient local economy, property ownership in an out-of-reach market, and the attainment of social status based on an ability to move through multiple neighbourhoods and venues with ease. As might be expected, African American and working class men are often left beyond the fray of these new neoliberal ideals
Queer social reproduction: co-opted, hollowed out, and resilient
No full textThe potential for queer perspectives to influence understanding social reproduction has been raised in human geography subfields as diverse as migration studies (Silvey, 2004), population geography (Bailey, 2009) and economic geography (Pollard et al. 2009). The dynamics of social reproduction practices within broader queer (e.g., lesbian, gay, and other sexually non-normative) communities is still relatively under-explored in geography (but see Gieseking, 2013; Gorman-Murray, 2012). Most of my own work during the past decade explores the formation of urban queer communities in North America, population movements into and out of these communities, and patterns of health and wellbeing within them. While I had never set out to examine social reproduction until very recently (Lewis and Mills, 2016), the various queer life events that comprise my research (e.g., coming out, finding work, making friends, and dealing with illness) are also inherently reliant on social reproductive practices. Activism, organizing, and belonging are not just political tools enabling the advancement of legal equalities for queer people, but also everyday practices that allow queer families, neighborhoods, and communities to sustain themselves. In this sense, social reproduction is not just something that can be queered but also something that for a portion of the population has always been inherently queer
Ottawa’s Le/The Village: creating a gaybourhood amidst the ‘death of the village’
No full textGay villages, usually defined as spatially concentrated configurations of bars, entertainment venues, community spaces, and homes associated with a gay-identified population, have received considerable attention from urban geographers studying gentrification. Frequently, gay villages have been critiqued as commodified spaces that serve mostly upper- and middle-class patrons. Yet they are also culturally and historically significant sites of mobilization, community building, and identity formation. During the last decade, media outlets in some North American cities have begun to dismiss gay villages as ‘declining’ or ‘dead.’ In models of ‘gay village evolution,’ decline is often positioned as a natural end precipitated by the commercialization and normalization of gay community spaces, the emergence of alternative venues in out-of-centre neighborhoods, and recent advancements in gay rights that render ‘safe’ spaces unnecessary. Using the case study of Ottawa, Canada’s Le/The Village, a gay village designated by the municipal government in November 2011, this paper argues that gay village decline, more a discursive trend than a foregone conclusion, is contingent upon both the historical and cultural particularities of cities and the intersecting subjectivities of those who encounter the village. The Ottawa case runs counter to discourse that dismisses gay villages as normalizing, over-commercialized, exclusionary, or simply passé. Using the narratives of 24 gay-identified men living in Ottawa, this article suggests that the absence of a village, as much as the creation and concretization of one, can perpetuate extant class and locational privilege within gay communities and that ‘new’ gay villages in smaller cities—perhaps more symbolic and psychic than capitalistic—may work to challenge the perpetuation of privilege
Researching LGB health and social policy: methodological issues and future directions
No full textResearchers interested in sexual minority health are beginning to examine contextual and environmental determinants of health such as neighbourhoods, health services, and social policies. Efforts to catalogue and systematise policies relating to the health of lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) individuals are therefore central in uncovering more comprehensive determinants of LGB health. This commentary identifies the links between social policy and LGB health, some methodological concerns of spatial analyses in this research area, and some future research directions. In particular, there is a need to integrate both migration and life course into understandings of the relationships between LGB health and jurisdictional policies
Moving “out,” moving on: gay men's migrations through the life course
No full textResearch in the field of sexuality and space has begun to explore the relationships between gay and queer sexual subjectivities and migration. Much of this research examines the regulation and policing of queer international migrants or identity formation processes among younger queer people migrating within countries. This study, although located partially within the second category, broadens and deepens existing accounts of gay men's migrations within countries by focusing on life circumstances and events beyond an initial coming-out process and considering the migration experiences of gay men at multiple points in the life course. This study uses life course theory to contextualize the migration narratives of 48 self-identified gay men in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and Washington, DC. The findings lend credence to recent claims that migration is central in the lives of gay men and other queer people but extends the concept of gay migration to include more than just the disclosure or initial development of a gay identity. They reframe migration as a tool used to negotiate a variety of life circumstances and transitions (e.g., establishing careers, creating meaningful community identities) rendered challenging by variegated landscapes of stigma and inclusion in North Americ
Rupture, resilience, and risk: relationships between mental health and migration among gay-identified men in North America
No full textAn established body of research in psychology, psychiatry and epidemiology links social stigma and stress with poor mental and sexual health outcomes among gay-identified men. Less work considers how these linkages are mediated by place and almost none considers the role of movement across places. This qualitative study, based on the migration narratives of 48 gay-identified men living in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and Washington, D.C., U.S.A. gives more careful consideration to the ways in which mental and emotional health issues (e.g., anxiety, depression, substance use) in this population both precipitate migration and stem from migration. The narratives show that decisions to migrate often emerge from men?s experiences of place-based minority stress and associated health outcomes. At the same time, moving to urban gay communities, when coupled with other life circumstances, can create or reinforce physical and emotional insecurities that lead to low self-esteem, substance use and sexual risk-taking
Mental health in sexual minorities: recent indicators, trends, and their relationships to place in North America and Europe
No full textThis meta-analysis featuring 12 national adult studies and 16 state/regional youth studies of sexuality and mental health finds that sexual minorities--as a likely consequence of place-contingent minority stress--experience mental health outcomes such as depression, anxiety, and suicide ideation much more frequently than their heterosexual counterparts. By interrogating the geographic variations in the findings, such as high rates of poor mental health outcomes in the United Kingdom, large gay-heterosexual disparities in the Netherlands, and lower and improving rates of both outcomes and risk factors in Vermont and British Columbia, this study asserts that policy regimes, health programming, and the ways in which sexual minorities are constructed in places all contribute to their mental health
Linked life courses in fieldwork: researcher, participant and field
No full textThis paper discusses the ways in which fieldwork transforms, and is transformed by, the life trajectories of researchers, participants and the field itself. I suggest that fieldwork interweaves the past training and ongoing development of the researcher, the personal and professional life courses of his/her research participants, and the cultural and institutional histories of both academic fields and the physical sites in which fieldwork is conducted. Each of these life course strands involves geographically contingent subjectivities and perspectives that coalesce in fieldwork and lead to productive exchanges as well as conflicts. Early career researchers in particular may face extensive challenges negotiating these conflicts in the context of competitive and neo-liberal academic environments
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