Celebration and Suppression: The Strategic Uses of Identity by the Lesbian and Gay Movement

Bernstein, Mary

doi:10.1086/231250

Cited by 594 publications

(530 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…43 Actually, long before this debate took place, Mary Bernstein (1997) had pointed out that gay and lesbian movements in the United States shifted from emphasizing identity to targeting the state depending upon the moves of the state and the anti-gay opposition. While my findings tend to be parallel to Bernstein's, in that we both emphasize the context-dependence of state-or society-orientation of movements, I focus more on everyday practices, their mechanisms, and the internal dynamics of the identity field, whereas Bernstein seems ultimately to reduce the dynamics of identity to political context.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Transforming everyday life: Islamism and social movement theory

Tuğal¹

2009

Theor Soc

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The Islamist movement in Turkey bases its mobilization strategy on transforming everyday practices. Public challenges against the state do not form a central part of its repertoire. New Social Movement theory provides some tools for analyzing such an unconventional strategic choice. However, as Islamist mobilization also seeks to reshape the state in the long run, New Social Movement theory (with its focus on culture and society and its relative neglect of the state) needs to be complemented by more institutional analyses. A hegemonic account of mobilization, which incorporates tools from theories of everyday life and identity-formation, as well as from state-centered approaches, is offered as a way to grasp the complexity of Islamism.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Transforming everyday life: Islamism and social movement theory

Tuğal¹

2009

Theor Soc

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“…Those who have examined it have documented its competing visions for a collective project. While some suggest it developed "unity through diversity" (Armstrong 2002), others have shown that diversity drives dissent (Bernstein 1997;Gamson 1995Gamson , 1997Ghaziani 2008;Robinson 2005;Warner 1993). This movement is therefore well-suited for an empirical study of infighting.…”

Section: Data and Analytic Strategymentioning

confidence: 99%

An “amorphous mist”? The problem of measurement in the study of culture

Ghaziani

2009

Theor Soc

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Sociological studies of culture have made significant progress on conceptual clarification of the concept, while remaining comparatively quiescent on questions of measurement. This study empirically examines internal conflicts (or "infighting"), a ubiquitous phenomenon in political organizing, to propose a "resinous culture framework" that holds promise for redirection. The data comprise 674 newspaper articles and more than 100 archival documents that compare internal dissent across two previously unstudied lesbian and gay Marches on Washington. Analyses reveal that activists use infighting as a vehicle to engage in otherwise abstract definitional debates that provide concrete answers to questions such as who are we and what do we want. The mechanism that enables infighting to concretize these cultural concerns is its coupling with fairly mundane and routine organizational tasks. This mechanism affords one way to release the culture concept, understood here as collective self-definitions, from being "an amorphous, indescribable mist which swirls around society members," as it was once provocatively described.Culture is "one of the two or three most complicated words in the English language" (Williams 1976: 87), one that has "acquired a certain aura of ill-repute...because of the multiplicity of its references and the studied vagueness with which it has all too often been invoked" (Geertz 1973: 89). Although the "cultural turn" buzz has subsided and despite efforts to move beyond it (Bonnell and Hunt 1999), the "cacophony of contemporary discourse about culture" (Sewell 1999: 35) continues unabated. 1 Conceptual debates over what the term means persist, which then have consequences for how to study it (Jepperson and Swidler 1994). One common route analysts pursue is to isolate what are called "cultural dimensions" from a distinct "social life." Examples range widely from how meaning-making and symbols affect Theor Soc

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“…She distinguishes between two types of identity deployment: identity for critique confronts the values, categories, and practices of the dominant culture and identity for education challenges the dominant culture's perception of the stigmatized minority. Bernstein (1997) illustrates identity deployment through the example of the gay rights movement. Gay rights activists employed identity for education when challenging negative stereotypes about lesbians and gay men, "such as having hundreds of sexual partners a year or struggling with uncontrollable sexual urges."…”

Section: Identity Movementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…21). Bernstein (1997) argues that identity movements with access to the polity and/or a strong organizational infrastructure will seek policy change, emphasize sameness rather than difference, and will use identity for education rather than identity for critique.…”

Section: Identity Movementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Atheist Scripts in a Nation of Religiosity: Identity Politics within the Atheist Movement

Frost¹

2000

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This thesis explores the use of identity politics within the atheist movement at both the national and individual levels. I conducted a content analysis of two national atheist groups and three best-selling atheist authors in order to assess the use of atheist identity politics at the national level. I then conducted 15 in-depth interviews with a sample of atheists in Portland, Oregon about their atheist identity and their reactions to and identification with national atheist movement strategies. Findings suggest that national atheist organizations and atheist authors are using a strategy of identity politics that encourage atheists to "come out" as atheists, complain about church/state violations, and criticize religion's influence in American society. They liken their movement to the gay identity movement and argue that as more atheists "come out", they will see less stigma and more respect towards atheists. However, individual atheists do not always identify with these movement strategies. Most participants said that atheism is not a particularly salient identity for them and thus most did not see themselves participating in atheist activism. Further, they implied that they experience little stigma in their everyday lives and are more concerned with promoting religious tolerance and secular policies. I argue that the lack of social identification with atheism, combined with limits to the gay analogy, are likely inhibitors to the success of an atheist movement. i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

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Celebration and Suppression: The Strategic Uses of Identity by the Lesbian and Gay Movement

Cited by 594 publications

References 21 publications

Transforming everyday life: Islamism and social movement theory

Transforming everyday life: Islamism and social movement theory

An “amorphous mist”? The problem of measurement in the study of culture

Atheist Scripts in a Nation of Religiosity: Identity Politics within the Atheist Movement

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