Current Projects //
BROKERING IDENTITY: EXPLORING THE CONSTRUCTION OF LGBT POLITICAL IDENTITY AND INTERESTS IN US POLITICS, 1968-2001 (book manuscript)
This study explores the brokering of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender interest group coalition between 1968 and 2004. Using three bodies of archival evidence -- institutional documents from various interest groups, a variety of LGBT publications, and transcripts of relevant debates from the Congressional Record -- I show how the evolution of a presumably unified "LGBT" identity category and associated agenda of political interests was constructed by political actors as a cohesive and unified minority group. The unity of this new minority group was achieved by foregrounding the political interests of gender-normative lesbians and gay men, particularly those who are white and middle-class, and issues like marriage and second-parent adoption were consequently elevated as the predominant political interests on behalf of the LGBT group. While this framing of the LGBT coalition allowed the projection of unity that is necessary in contemporary interest group politics, this research reveals that constructing LGBT as a minority group in these ways entailed the silencing of political concerns that impact the most vulnerable segments of the new LGBT identity group. As a result, employment nondiscrimination legislation or prison reforms that would benefit LGBT people of color and those who do not conform to gender norms were deprioritized as political objectives. In other words, although political actors work to assert LGBT people as a unified marginalized group in relation to straight people, they do so by presenting LGBT people along a single axis of identity: sexuality. The implication of this framing is that significant inequalities are produced among members within the identity category and coalition of LGBT, especially for people of color and people who are perceived to be challenging gender norms.
Manuscripts in Preparation //
“The Contested Racial Politics of LGBTQ Identification: Concurrent Organizing by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and Southerners on New Ground, 1993-2000.” With Lisa Beard.
“Identities Under Surveillance: Measuring Gender at the Airport and in Survey Research”
"Transing Political Science" Dialogues for Politics, Groups, and Identities
Find me on Google Scholar
BROKERING IDENTITY: EXPLORING THE CONSTRUCTION OF LGBT POLITICAL IDENTITY AND INTERESTS IN US POLITICS, 1968-2001 (book manuscript)
This study explores the brokering of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender interest group coalition between 1968 and 2004. Using three bodies of archival evidence -- institutional documents from various interest groups, a variety of LGBT publications, and transcripts of relevant debates from the Congressional Record -- I show how the evolution of a presumably unified "LGBT" identity category and associated agenda of political interests was constructed by political actors as a cohesive and unified minority group. The unity of this new minority group was achieved by foregrounding the political interests of gender-normative lesbians and gay men, particularly those who are white and middle-class, and issues like marriage and second-parent adoption were consequently elevated as the predominant political interests on behalf of the LGBT group. While this framing of the LGBT coalition allowed the projection of unity that is necessary in contemporary interest group politics, this research reveals that constructing LGBT as a minority group in these ways entailed the silencing of political concerns that impact the most vulnerable segments of the new LGBT identity group. As a result, employment nondiscrimination legislation or prison reforms that would benefit LGBT people of color and those who do not conform to gender norms were deprioritized as political objectives. In other words, although political actors work to assert LGBT people as a unified marginalized group in relation to straight people, they do so by presenting LGBT people along a single axis of identity: sexuality. The implication of this framing is that significant inequalities are produced among members within the identity category and coalition of LGBT, especially for people of color and people who are perceived to be challenging gender norms.
Manuscripts in Preparation //
“The Contested Racial Politics of LGBTQ Identification: Concurrent Organizing by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and Southerners on New Ground, 1993-2000.” With Lisa Beard.
“Identities Under Surveillance: Measuring Gender at the Airport and in Survey Research”
"Transing Political Science" Dialogues for Politics, Groups, and Identities
Find me on Google Scholar