Dangerous Waters and Brave Space: A Critical Feminist Inquiry of Campus LGBTQ Centers

Abstract

Grounded in critical feminisms, this study examines lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) centers at public universities in the context of the regulating discourse of homonormative whiteness. Homonormative whiteness refers to dominant norms that constitute the queer body as White and male, positioning static ideas of whiteness and masculinity as normative. Interviews, including the use of mental maps, were conducted with 12 primary leaders at six campus LGBTQ centers. Findings signal three primary functions of LGBTQ centers: safety, legitimacy, and advocacy. Each function is situated in relation to the degree to which these centers spatially or discursively reproduce, resist, and/or transform homonormative whiteness. Taken together, these findings suggest a dynamic and context-specific understanding of the ways and reasons LGBTQ center leaders will act or otherwise shape the space and discourse of the center in ways that collude with or transform systems of power and dominance. Implications for research and practice, as well as specific recommendations for critically conscious organizational practice, are offered.

KEYWORDS:

• discourse
• organizations
• queer
• feminism
• mapping
• space

Notes

¹Fraser coined this expression by combining two terms that other theorists had recently used with good effects for purposes that were consistent with her own theoretical stance. “Subaltern” comes from Spivak (1988) “Counterpublic” was first used by Felski (1989) as a feminist critique of the public sphere.

²This matrix structure is reminiscent of the Youth Development Philosophy Matrix developed by Sutton, Kemp, Gutiérrez, and Saegert (2006) and their work on Urban Youth Programs in America for the Ford Foundation.

³Conservative Religious is a stand-in construct for a specific religious group used to conceal the identity of the group and maintain the anonymity and confidentiality of the center and university.