Lesbian and Bisexual Identities: Constructing Communities, Constructing Selves

Synopsis

This book examines the stories of lesbian and bisexual women in a Northeast community who share who they are, how they have come to see themselves as lesbian or bisexual, and what those identities mean to them. Drawing on social constructionist approaches to identity, Kristin G. Esterberg argues that identities are multiple and contingent. Created within the context of specific communities and within specific relationships, lesbian and bisexual identities are ways of sorting through experiences of desires and attractions, relationships, and politics. Their meanings change over time as women grow older and have more varied experiences, as the communities and sociopolitical worlds in which they live change, and as their life circumstances alter. In interviews conducted over a four-year time period, women describe the lesbian community they live in; how they see its structure, its social groups, its informal rules and norms for behavi and their places inside -- or on the margins of -- the community. Lesbian and Bisexual Identities reveals how women fall in and out of love, how they "perform" lesbian or bisexual identity through clothing, hairstyle, body language, and talk, and many other aspects typically not considered. The women present a variety of accounts. Some consider themselves "lesbian from birth" and have constructed their lives accordingly, while others have experienced significant shifts in their identities, depending on the influences of feminism, progressive politics, the visibility of the lesbian community, and other factors. Esterberg offers vivid accounts that defy the stereotypes so commonly offered. Lesbian and Bisexual Identities not only presents women's stories in their own words, it moves beyond storytelling to understand how these accounts resonate with social science theories of identity and community.

Copyright:

1997

Book Details

Book Quality:

Publisher Quality

Book Size:

216 Pages

ISBN-13:

9781439904428

Related ISBNs:

9781566395106, 9781566395090

Publisher:

Temple University Press

Date of Addition:

07/11/13

Copyrighted By:

Kristin G. Esterberg

Adult content:

No

Language:

English

Has Image Descriptions:

No

Categories:

Nonfiction, Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender, Psychology, Social Studies

Submitted By:

Bookshare Staff

Usage Restrictions:

This is a copyrighted book.