The changing experiences of bisexual male adolescents

Abstract

Drawing on in-depth interviews with 15 openly bisexual male youth from sixth forms across the UK, this article documents positive experiences of bisexual male youth in school: participants had positive coming out experiences and did not encounter significant discrimination or harassment because of their sexual identity. Participants attribute this to the inclusive environments of their schools and local cultures. Examining the narratives of two participants who had negative experiences, this article also highlights continued issues for bisexual youth in schools. It thus advances our understanding of contemporary bisexual lives in educational institutions, and contributes to debates about whether sixth forms are more inclusive spaces than secondary schools for bisexuals.

Keywords:

• biphobia
• bisexuality
• coming out
• homophobia
• inclusion
• sixth form

Notes

1. Academics have studied the nature and effects of prejudice and discrimination against sexual minorities for several decades, and have tended to call this homophobia. Despite critiques of the term (Herek 2004), it continues to have sociological utility (McCormack and Anderson 2014). Given that research documenting a liberalisation of attitudes towards sexual minorities has tended to use the term homophobia (McCormack, 2012a, 2012b; Weeks 2007), we use ‘homophobia’ in this article to refer to general forms of sexual minority prejudice, and use the term the bisexual burden (Anderson, McCormack, and Ripley 2014) to refer to prejudice that is unique to bisexuals.

2. Sixth form colleges are post-16 educational institutions in the UK where students gain qualifications needed for university or working life.