This article focuses on the relations between the two geo-temporal categories-Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and West/Europe-in discussions about sexual politics, homophobia, tolerance, and nationhood. It contributes to the existing literature about homonationalism and sexual nationalisms by introducing CEE to the debate's geographical loci, so far mostly invested in West/Europe and its relations to Islam. It argues that it is important to consider CEE in sexual nationalism debates because of its framing as the European (homophobic) Other in the emerging discourses of 'homoinclusive Europe'. This article introduces the concept of leveraged pedagogy, which captures the specificity of the West/Europe-CEE discourses of sexual liberation, advancement, and backwardness. Leveraged pedagogy is a hegemonic didactical relation where the CEE figures as an object of the West/European 'pedagogy', and is framed as permanently 'post-communist', 'in transition' (i.e. not liberal, not yet, not enough), and homophobic. Such 'taking care of' CEE, it is argued, is a form of cultural hegemony of the Western EUropean liberal model of rights as the universal.
In this article I ask why gay and lesbian people in Poland mourned their infamously homophobic president Lech Kaczynski, and, in turn, what it means to mourn one's own enemy. In examining this extraordinary case of national bereavement and the collective performance of grief, I point to complex models of attachment that position Polish homosexual subjects in a locus where they are able to enter the national discourse as subjects, and not only as abjects. I stress the role of identification rather than identity, relationality, processuality and performativity in understanding the relations between nationhood and homosexuality. Homosexual subjects attaining the rituals of national bereavement break the chains of interlinked subject positions and social expectations. In doing so, nationhood is rendered a “hybrid” space of identification for the homosexual subject. Consequently, mourning becomes an act of “queering” the nation, a wilful subversion of culturally and traditionally sanctioned performative recollections of nationhood (Polishness).
Objective: To assess an intervention to familiarise parents with children's books for use in primary (5 to 11 years) sex and relationship education (SRE) classes.Method: Case study of a seven-week programme in one London primary school, using ethnographic observation, semi-structured interviews and focus groups with parents (n = 7) and key stakeholders (n = 4), and pre-and post-programme selfcompletion questionnaires (n = 9).Results: Parents reported increased understanding of the SRE curriculum and awareness of relevant children's books, enhanced interactions with their children on SRE topics, and some positive effects on partners and attitudes towards the school.There was increased confidence in addressing issues in the SRE curriculum for parents of 8-10 year olds, although reduced confidence for one mother.Conclusions: Familiarising parents with materials has the potential to enhance SRE, by improving coherence between educators' and parents' messages to children about sex and relationships, increased discussion of SRE topics in parent-child conversations and reduced parental anxiety about topics such as sexual orientation.The authors identify future challenges of involving fathers, scalability and sustainability.2
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