Gender and Sexuality in Education and Health

Advocating for Equity and Social Justice

Jacqueline Ullman, Tania Ferfolja

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781138493452
• eBook ISBN: 9781351028004
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Highlighting the voices less commonly showcased to the public – voices of young people, parents, and social and health practitioners – this book comments on gender and sexuality in the contexts of formal and informal education, peer cultures and non-conformity, social sustainability and equal rights.

At a time of mounting conservatism globally – when broader issues of equity and justice around sexuality and gender in education and health have come under attack – it is critical that health workers, social service practitioners and educators share approaches, stories, and data across these spaces to advocate for informative, inclusive approaches to sex, gender and sexuality education in an effort to speak back to the conservative voices which currently dominate policy spaces. This book was originally published as a special issue of Sex Education.

Dogma before diversity: the contradictory rhetoric of controversy and diversity in the politicisation of Australian queer-affirming learning materials

Barrie Shannon and Stephen J. Smith

ABSTRACT

This paper discusses contradictory imperatives in contemporary Australian pedagogy – the notions of ‘controversy’ and ‘diversity’ as they relate the subjects of genders and sexualities. It is a common view that both gender and sexuality are important organising features of identity, society and politics. Consistent effort is made in the Australian educational context to combat discrimination, prejudice against sexually, and gender ‘diverse’ people. However, the state’s commitment to diversity policies must be balanced with a secondary focus on appeasing those who are hostile to non-heteronormative expression, or who view such expression as inherently ‘political’ in nature and therefore inappropriate for the school setting. Australia has arguably demonstrated this dilemma recently in two notable controversies: an intervention in planned school screenings of Gayby Baby, a documentary exploring the experience of children in same-sex families, and media furore over the trans-positive All of Us teaching kit. Using these case studies, this paper explores the competing imperatives of controversy and diversity, commenting on the tendency for the lives and experiences of LGBTIQ people becoming consequently politicised. To do so, is arguably detrimental to the meaningful participation of LGBTIQ people as social citizens.

Introduction

Gender and sexuality are very often relegated to the domain of the personal and private; and yet they lie at the heart of many of our public conversations and form ‘some of our most pressing sociocultural and political debates’ (Alexander 2008, 1). These debates, in turn, serve as ‘key components of how we conceive ourselves personally, organise ourselves collectively, and figure ourselves politically’ (Alexander 2008, 1). Sexuality is of primary importance in the creation of individual and collective identity and a ‘prime connecting point between body, self-identity and social norms’ (Giddens 1992, 15). The ‘varied ways in which narratives of intimacy, pleasure, the body, gender, and identity become constructed and disseminated personally, socially and politically’ (Alexander 2008, 1) are connected through ‘complex discourses, and political formations mediated through ideological investments’ (Alexander 2008, 1).

Within the educational context, provision for the discussion of gender and sexuality at any real level of critical engagement is limited in contemporary Australian school curricula. Any direct exploration of issues related to human sexuality tends to be limited to specific areas of the curriculum that deal with health, biology and sport (Shannon and Smith 2015). The focus of this curriculum perspective, however, rarely provides sufficient opportunities for a more nuanced discussion of gender and sexuality-related issues, such as intimacy, eroticism, sexualities, gender roles and ethics, which form the basis for a more sophisticated knowledge and understanding of gender and sexuality.

Despite the widespread invisibility of queer-affirming content, state and territory governments expend significant effort attempting to provide ‘support’ for sexual and gender diversity in the form of policies and best practice documents. This paper considers issues of diverse sexualities and genders, and demonstrates how such diversities, rather than being readily embraced, instead form the basis for ongoing controversy in educational contexts.

From a Foucauldian perspective, discourse is a praxis that ‘systematically forms the objects of which they speak’ (Foucault in Ball 1990, 2, 5) and which is reinforced through its ‘material base in established social institutions and practices’ (Weedon 1987, 100). According to Weedon (1987, 21), it is in language, as the basis for the ‘constitution of discourse and subjectivities’ (Ferfolja 2013, 161), where meaning is produced, and it is in language where ‘actual and possible forms of social organisation and their likely social and political consequences are defined and contested’ (Weedon 1987, 21). Ferfolja warns that ‘the power of language and its ability to perpetuate discrimination should not be underestimated’ (Ferfolja 2013, 161). In terms of the way in which gay men and lesbians are positioned, she further argues (Ferfolja 2013, 161) that comments which might be construed as relatively harmless in its effects by its speaker may, in fact, serve to bolster ‘the power of the discriminatory discourses’, the intention of which being to maintain the privileged heteronormative status quo.

At this point, it is important to interrogate some of the language that will be used in this paper. Discourses about the rights, health and welfare of people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer (LGBTIQ), or any other diverse expression of sexuality or gender, often employ umbrella terms such as ‘queer’. Terms such as queer is used, often for semantic purposes, in order to capture a group that consists a wide range of identifying experiences and meanings. In contrast, some queer academics may indeed use terms such as ‘queer’ as a form of strategic essentialism (Spivak 1989) that facilitates collective political advocacy for those outside of the heteronorm.

This phenomenon has been the subject of a central criticism that gender theorists and transgender academics have sought to mount. Ansara (2010) has critiqued the ‘coercive queering’ of transgender and gender diverse people in academic literature; the ‘lumping in’ of gender diverse people under umbrella terms such as LGBTIQ and ‘queer’ despite a lack of meaningful focus on these specific groups. Throughout this paper, the term queer will be used to refer to people who defy heteronormative conventions of sexuality and gender presentation. Queer-affirming learning materials, then, are educational tools designed for classroom use that openly embrace LGBTIQ issues, and that aim to facilitate critique of heteronormativity.

Two recent sagas in Australia have demonstrated a poignant example of the state’s commitment to fostering ‘diversity’ through the use of queer-affirming learning materials being superseded by their need to handle controversy as a form of ‘risk management’. The first example this paper will employ as a brief case study is the documentary film Gayby Baby, a film that chronicles the lives of children living with same-sex parents. The film was ‘banned’ in New South Wales (NSW) schools in 2015 by a ministerial decree in response to conservative media backlash. The second is the negative media reaction to the All of Us teaching kit, which was developed by LGBTIQ youth network Minus18 and the Safe Schools Coalition. The teaching kit comprehensively addresses queerness, and specifically, transgender issues. The moral panic surrounding All of Us, which was broadly referred to as the ‘Safe Schools’ controversy, has generated persistent public discussion about whether schools are an appropriate setting for criticism of sex and gender roles.

The paper further seeks to expose both the overt and covert heterosexualised processes at work, and to demonstrate how those processes deride attitudes towards ‘atypical’ sexual practices, gender presentations and family arrangements. The paper will reveal what is seen as a ‘neoliberalisation’ of diversity; a continuing reassembly of hegemonic masculinity that renders diversity and inclusion justifiable only when the diverse subject willingly assimilates into existing economic and social practice.

Rhetoric of ‘controversy’ and ‘diversity’

Diversity discourse

The term diversity is variously used in a number of Australian state and territory government educational policy documents (ACARA 2015; MCEETYA 2008), but nowhere is it clearly defined. Diversity is paradoxically understood within the Australian Curriculum to encompass individual students’ ‘diverse capabilities’ (ACARA 2015). ‘All students have diverse learning needs and, regardless of a student’s circumstances, all students should be afforded the same opportunities and choices in their education and their diversity catered for through personalised learning’ (ACARA 2015). What differentiates students and makes them diverse are their ‘current levels of learning, strengths, goals and interests’, as well as their degree of physical and mental (dis)ability, whether they fall into the gifted and talented group or whether English is their first or additional language (ACARA 2015).

It is important to note here the meeting of the nation’s Ministers of Education in 2008, which resulted in the publication of the Melbourne Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians. The document argues that the role of education is to equip students with an ‘appreciation of and respect for social, cultural and religious diversity’, a ‘sense of self-worth, self-awareness and personal identity’, ‘personal values’ and ‘respect for others’ (MCEETYA 2008, 4; 9; 5; italics added). The Melbourne Declaration, however, as with the other relevant documents already mentioned, does not provide a concrete definition of ‘diversity’.

Further to this discussion, the Australian Health and Physical Education (F-10) curriculum document states that that it seeks to value diversity ‘by providing for multiple means of representation, action, expression and engagement’ (ACARA 2015). The document reiterates the abovementioned criteria for a ‘diverse’ student, but to this list is added ‘[s]ame-sex attracted and gender-diverse students’. ‘[I]t is crucial’, the document states, ‘to acknowledge and affirm diversity in relation to sexuality and gender in Health and Physical Education’ (ACARA 2015). Teaching programmes are expected to recognise ‘the impact of diversity on students’ social worlds, acknowledge and respond to the needs of all students, and provide more meaningful and relevant learning opportunities for all students’ (ACARA 2015), while all school communities shoulder the responsibility to ensure that teaching programmes are ‘relevant to the lived experiences of all students’ (ACARA 2015).

Interestingly, the requirement that schools provide an affirmation for all kinds of diversity can create contradictions in policy. In the South Australian context, for example, teachers are guided to acknowledge sexual and gender diversity, while delivering sex education in a ‘sensitively and developmentally appropriate’ (Shannon and Smith 2015, 646) way that also considers cultural and religious ‘diversities’ as well. Shannon and Smith (2015) continue that ‘the South Australian curriculum does not, however, define sensitivity, nor does it reveal the standards by which children are judged to be “developmentally” prepared for any particular aspect of the sexuality education curriculum’, creating a confusing conundrum for school administrators, teachers and indeed students.

A support document for the current NSW Personal Development, Health and Physical Education (PDHPE) curriculum highlights the importance of acknowledging ‘sexual diversity’, providing information to facilitate teaching activities that educate on homophobia, discrimination and negative effects on queer students (NSW Department of Education and Communities 2011). Sexuality is described as being ‘diverse’, ‘fluid’ and ‘dynamic’, involving not only a person’s sexual behaviour but also their sexual orientation and identity. The NSW PDHPE Teaching Sexual Health webpage, which was decommissioned during the writing of this paper, points to a number of ways in which schools can challenge recognised assumptions and negative community values, attitudes and expectations in order to cater positively for students. The online document stresses the need ‘to teach students about respecting and celebrating diversity’ in such a way as to provide students ‘with more effective options for explaining their world’ (NSW Department of Education and Communities 2011). In terms of the major concerns of this paper, the document states that it is the responsibility of schools to ‘ensure that sexual diversity is acknowledged’. Provision is made for ‘examples that are gender and sexually diverse when representing families and significant relationships’ in teaching and learning activities which ‘use a range of scenarios, not just heterosexual characters’ (NSW Department of Education and Communities 2011). A clear silence in this document and throughout education policy more broadly, is the lack of attention given to trans and gender non-conforming students (Ullman and Ferfolja 2015). Despite the claims in the Teaching Sexual Health resource that sexuality is fluid and is broader than just an individual’s sexual behaviour, diversity is afforded quite a narrow discursive definition. Here, diversity refers specifically to gay and lesbian students; the privilege of ‘acknowledgment’ and ‘celebration’ is not specifically extended to students whose diversity goes further than same-sex attraction.

Sexualities, genders and controversy

The key to the appropriate integration of sexualities and genders into schools as discursive places is a renewed focus on the critical exploration of sexuality, gender and power within the school curricula (Jones 2011; Shannon and Smith 2015). However to do so at school is not a simple task, as notions of controversy and community anxiety permeate contemporary debate (Shannon and Smith 2015). Critical exploration of sexual diversity is rare, ‘due to [its] positioning as sensitive or too controversial for school communities’ (Ferfolja 2013, 162). Such positioning results in what Ferfolja (2013, 162) describes as the perpetuation of ‘silence in relation to these issues: first through the removal of the child so they are not exposed to the information; and second, by ensuring that teachers’ work is monitored, essentially discouraging teachers from broaching difficult knowledges’. Indeed, teachers perpetuate silence on ‘controversial’ or ‘political’ issues out of a fear of backlash and moral panic, among other factors (Carrion and Jensen 2014; Johnson, Sendall, and McCuaig 2014).

One strategy to expand the range students’ discursive options is to present queer lives through their lived experiences of family and identity, and their everyday decisions and activities. On the one hand, such a strategy provides opportunities for the legitimate claiming of subject and voice, whilst, on the other, opponents might regard such actions as naïve expressions of identity politics. Activists might call for a more radical approach, arguing that to propagate a cultural narrative of deep-down sameness and similarity depoliticises questions of identity into merely personal struggles, cordoning off the personal as a realm totally separate from the political (Queirolo 2013). It is from the position of privilege which dominant heteronormative discourses bestow heterosexual power and authority. To present alternatives to the heterosexist understandings of family, property, marriage, sex, gender and sexuality is to question and challenge that position of privilege.

The following case studies, which clearly validate Ferfolja’s (2013) findings, demonstrate how attempts to overcome the silence and to expose students to a presentation of alternative sexualities and family structures can be suppressed.

Gayby Baby and Safe Schools

The ban on Gayby Baby

Gayby Baby (2013) is a documentary film directed by Maya Newell that portrays the lives of four young children of same-sex couples. The insight into the children’s lives the film provides encapsulates the dreams, fears and aspirations of youth on the verge of puberty, stumbling to find their own place in the world. The children navigate their lives alongside their parents; gay and lesbian couples who themselves face certain degrees of uncertainty and vulnerability, embodying a very public rejection of gendered norms. The film serves a transformative role, challenging the notion of what constitutes the modern Australian family, and how and by whom it should be defined. It sets up the notions and conventions of heteronormativity for serious criticism, by presenting a personalised tale of each of the protagonists as a ‘living, moving portrait of same-sex families that offers a refreshingly honest picture of the value systems that really count in modern life’ (Marla House 2015).

The documentary champions the ‘legitimacy’ and health of these families by adopting the very techniques which opponents of marriage equality and same-sex parenting use to rationalise their prejudiced arguments against social change. It provides a platform for the voices of real children and their lived experiences into the current national dialogue on the personal and political issue of marriage equality and same-sex parenting, signifying a groundbreaking departure from traditional ‘adults-only’ discourse.

Following Gayby Baby’s success at various national and international film ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Citation Information
• Notes on Contributors
• Introduction: Gender and sexuality in education and health: voices advocating for equity and social justice
• 1 Dogma before diversity: the contradictory rhetoric of controversy and diversity in the politicisation of Australian queer-affirming learning materials
• 2 ‘Is it like one of those infectious kind of things?’ The importance of educating young people about HPV and HPV vaccination at school
• 3 Teacher positivity towards gender diversity: exploring relationships and school outcomes for transgender and gender-diverse students
• 4 That’s so homophobic? Australian young people’s perspectives on homophobic language use in secondary schools
• 5 Knowing, performing and holding queerness: LGBTIQ+ student experiences in Australian tertiary education
• 6 ‘That happened to me too’: young people’s informal knowledge of diverse genders and sexualities
• 7 Responsibilities, tensions and ways forward: parents’ perspectives on children’s sexuality education
• 8 Gender and sexuality diversity and schooling: progressive mothers speak out
• 9 Young people, sexuality and diversity. What does a needs-led and rights-based approach look like?
• Index