Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender 2012 Abstracts
Faculty
An Eminent Illustrator and the Man Behind the Man: J.C. Leyendecker and Charles Beach • Rodger Streitmatter, American University • This paper focuses on the relationship between J. C. Leyendecker, the most successful American magazine illustrator during the early 1900s, and his same-sex partner Charles Beach, who played critical roles in the artist’s success. Hundreds of Leyendecker’s hand-painted images appeared on the covers of such leading magazines as the Saturday Evening Post and Vanity Fair, and hundreds more images appeared in advertisements. Much of the artist’s success was due to the behind-the-scene creative and business decisions that were made by Beach.
Student
Covering the other: A historical analysis of the Stonewall Uprising and GLBT rights movement • Chad Painter, University of Missouri • In the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, New York police officers raided the West Village bar the Stonewall Inn. Similar raids had happened before, but this time was different because those inside the Stonewall Inn fought back. This historical study focused on the New York media’s coverage of the Stonewall Uprising, with an emphasis on two front-page articles in the July 3, 1969, edition of The Village Voice.
I See Gay People: Exploration of Television Program Types, Acceptance of Homosexuals, and the Para-Social Contact Hypothesis • Dave Wilcox, University of Wisconsin – Madison • An analysis of program types found preferences for television programming genres correlate with acceptance of homosexuals when measured against support for same-sex marriage. This research seeks to provide support for the para-social contact hypothesis, previously shown to be present at the individual program level, at the program genre level. Significant positive relationships were found in information and entertainment programming, indicating content need not center on same-sex characterizations to affect acceptance levels.
Stars, Stripes, and Gays: Coverage of the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ repeal in military news • Paige Madsen, University of Iowa • This study examined the framing of the repeal of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy in the military paper, Stars and Stripes. Textual analysis of both original stories and reader comments reveal three main themes: one of challenges or obstacles, one of social experimentation, and one of homosexuality being wrong.
Broadband Bugchasers: The digital, physical, and social habits of those who purposely give/contract HIV • Cory Weaver, S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications – Syracuse University • This study digs deeper into the community of people who purposely contract and spread HIV and seeks to develop a greater understanding of these individuals using digital ethnography. Rather than focusing on the surface details of what bugchasers and giftgivers do, this study seeks to provide in-depth analysis of how this community functions online, how they negotiate their own social deviance, and offers a revised theory of why bugchasers and giftgivers engage in such risky behaviors.
Aliens in the Closet: Representations of LGBT Characters in American Science Fiction Television Programs • Laura Osur, Syracuse University • This paper problematizes the symbolic annihilation of LGBT characters in science fiction television programs. Through a textual analysis of American science fiction programs, I find that science fiction shows are willing to represent diverse, strong, and three-dimensional LGBT characters who are in intimate physical relationships with same-sex partners, although there are too few of these characters. Science fiction television is well suited to present LGBT issues in radical, progressive, and important ways.
Clearing the Bench: Framing the 2010 Iowa Fight Over Gay Marriage • Shawn Harmsen, University of Iowa • This framing analysis of newspaper coverage of the 2010 Iowa Supreme Court Justice Retention vote identifies dominant and subordinate frames in media coverage of the race, and considers the ways in which those frames may have helped shape the outcome of the election, which was itself largely seen as a referendum on gay marriage in the state.
Print friendly
