Heteronormativity: School, ideology, and politics

Abstract

This article analyzes discomfort about sexuality expressed in formal education. It draws on Foucault's analysis of sexuality as a privileged object of biopolitics (the object of regulation, surveillance, and discipline) and the most instrumentalized element in power relations in the Western world. Related to this is also the pedagogization of child sexuality, which even today is still characterized by ambiguities and discomfort. The author concludes that silence about non-hetero-sexualities and the biomedicalization and physicalization of (homo)sexuality are the most common and obvious symptoms of discomfort about (homo)sexuality in Slovenian schools. These manners of treating sexuality are usually interpreted as neutral, but the author interprets them as strategies of conflict avoidance which in fact support a heteronormative social order and (implicitly or explicitly) even legitimize the exclusion of all who cross the boundaries of 'normal heterosexuality'. They strengthen prejudice, motivate ignorance, and can even be used as an excuse for violence. The article points out that education does not provide a magic formula since it cannot foresee its own effects due to the complexity of social relations and the nature of the education process (e.g. Millot, 1983).

Exploring the impact of panoptic heteronormativity on UK primary teachers advocating for LGBTQ+ inclusive education

“…These controversies are concerned with what Richardson (1986: 27) details as ‘different opinions, values and priorities, and, basically and essentially, with different material interests’. They are the subject of vocal public discussion about what is considered ‘right, permissible, acceptable, and healthy, and what is not’ (Čeplak, 2013: 164). And whilst attitudes towards gender and sexuality have become more progressive (Nussbaum, 2018), hysteria over same-sex relationships has died down in many (but not all) schools with 82% of 1001 parents questioned by the charity Just Like Us (2022) supporting LGBT education and learning about LGBTQ+ .…”

(Re)construir Movimiento Pedagógico en Chile Pensando en Conjunto El Trabajo Docente

“…1) La creciente movilización feminista secundaria y universitaria en Chile del año 2018. Jóvenes, universitarias y secundarias de instituciones públicas y privadas, paralizan sus estudios solicitando cambios radicales en el sistema político, económico, social y educativo, históricamente reconocido como masculino y hegemónico (Cabello, 2018;Ceplak, 2013;Bonino, 2003;Strear, 2017). Una de las peticiones centrales que exige este movimiento es la construcción de políticas con perspectiva de género que cercenen el enfoque patriarcal de la educación sexista, su lenguaje discriminatorio, el abuso/acoso sexual ejercido por docentes por décadas, la reproducción de los roles de género, etcétera (Zerán, 2018).…”

Homonormativity and celebrating diversity: Australian school staff involvement in gay-straight alliances

“…Schools have consistently been found to sites for the reproduction of heteronormativity (Čeplak, 2013;Gansen, 2017). School practices that are meant to be LGBTI-inclusive, for example, 'celebration days' like Wear It Purple Day and Harmony Day , may inadvertently 'other' (Elia & Eliason, 2010) LGBTI-identifying students by drawing attention to their sexual identities, which they may or may not want to publicly share (Toynton, 2006).…”