subject: Positioning in Classroom Readings of LGBT-Themed Texts [print this page] Across the classrooms these researchers studied, homophobia was normalized, and students were free and even empowered to maintain a homophobic position, at times in ways that were self-degrading. Greenbaum's aims, for example, were to reach both gay/lesbian and straight-identified Replica Tag Heuer students, helping the former hear their voices actively in texts, and helping the latter see the range of "ways to be sexual in the world" . Even with these expressed goals, however, Greenbaum's single gay-identified student, who was not out to his peers, felt he could only enter a class discussion and raise issues related to homosexuality "in homophobic disguise," asking in a discussion of Conrad's The Secret Sharer, "Is this about faggots?" His question reinforces the emphatic positioning of young people as straight and homophobic in schools and the socially sanctioned demand that students position themselves as such, despite Greenbaum's efforts.
Positioning in Classroom Readings of LGBT-Themed Texts
