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The study emerges against a global and local backdrop of longstanding oppression and stigmatization of gays and lesbians, due to their sexual orientation. Regardless of transformative policies in South Africa which declare equal acceptance, treatment and inclusion of gay and lesbian citizens, prejudice and unfair discrimination still exists. The study investigates the experiences of gays and lesbians living in the Inanda area of Durban, KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa with the view to developing a greater understanding of their experiences and realities of ‘otherness’ and oppression. The conceptual model which frames the study is based on the generic model of social identity development and general model of oppression put forward by Hardiman and Jackson (1997), offering a useful lens through which to better identify oppression in the experiences and realities of gays and lesbians. The focus on understanding human experiences locates the study firmly within a qualitative research design. This focus also led to the selection of personal narratives as the strategy of inquiry, thereby allowing the researcher to enter worlds of experiences different from her own. Face- to- face, semi-structured interviews with eight participants (four gays and four lesbians, between the ages of twenty one and twenty five) comprised the method of data generation. The participants were selected as a result of a snowballing sample method. All live near each other in the Inanda area and are in regular social contact with each other. While research using a small sample of eight participants from the Inanda area cannot claim to be a comprehensive study into the experiences of gays and lesbians in all South African communities, these narratives reflect to a large degree, experiences of ‘otherness’ and oppression common to all gay and lesbian people. / M. Ed. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 2014.

The author explores the barriers faced by gays and lesbians in accessing relevant and non-biased counselling services. The investigation utilizes a qualitative research design that borrows procedures from a grounded theory model for research. The first goal of this study is to review the ways in which helping professionals have historically responded to homosexuality. Current obstacles to participation in counselling are then investigated through interviews with ten lesbians and gays. Respondents identify barriers to service as including concern about interventions aimed at reorientation, the client's comfort level with their own sexual identity and heterosexist bias within the therapeutic approach. Given the sense of alienation individuals describe in relation to conventional helping systems, the author reflects on the variety of alternatives to counselling that lesbians and gays may employ in addressing problems. As most participants report having had some form of contact with counselling practitioners, the researcher examines how clients determine comfort within a therapeutic setting. Assessments about suitability of service inform decisions related to 'coming out' to the helper and proceeding or terminating with participation in counselling. The study concludes with a series of recommendations about the development of a more accessible approach to clinical service. The respondents advise that practitioners commit themselves to a process of reeducation that entails challenging internalized bias and expanding their knowledge base with regard to gay and lesbian issues. It is suggested that accessibility is enhanced through the counsellor's efforts to outline agency confidentiality policies; adopt inclusive language; ensure the presence of physical indicators of a lesbian and gay clientele; and, the promotion of a visible profile within the sexual minority communities. The author argues that counselling professionals have a responsibility to advocate for the rights of those citizens who belong to the gay and lesbian minorities.

The focus of this dissertation entitled 'Difference, Identification & Desire: Contemporary Lesbian Genre Fiction' is the representation of lesbian identity in four contemporary popular lesbian genres: autobiographical fiction, speculative fiction, romance fiction and crime fiction. The aim of the dissertation is three-fold. Firstly, it seeks to acknowledge and celebrate the large variety of representations of lesbianism produced by lesbian writers working with popular forms of the novel during the past twenty five years. Secondly, it explores the ways in which lesbian writers have reworked popular genres in order to highlight lesbian and feminist concerns and to depict aspects of lesbian existence. It analyzes the effects of introducing discourses of lesbianism into the plots of popular genres, showing how the latter have been subverted or adapted by lesbian use. Thirdly, the thesis seeks to specify the ways in which the generic forms themselves, according to their own codes and conventions, shape and mediate the representation of lesbian identity in the text. In addition to this focus, the dissertation traces a number of themes and concerns across and within the four genres under discussion. These include the relationship in the texts between the sign 'lesbian' and the discourse of feminism, and the oscillation between the representation of lesbian sexual identity in terms of woman-identification and difference-between women. The aim throughout the analysis of contemporary lesbian genre fiction is to identify both that which is specific to lesbian representation and that which is characteristic of the particular genre under discussion. The dissertation represents a contribution to three areas of literary study: Genre Studies and Feminist Studies in general, and to Lesbian Studies in particular.

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A growing number of lesbian women are choosing to have children within the context of an openly lesbian lifestyle. This dissertation research represents a departure from much previous work in this area, with a shift in focus from children of lesbian and gay parents in the UK or North America, to an exploration of the perspectives and experiences of lesbian parents themselves within two particular European contexts. Interviews were carried out with 68 lesbian women in Sweden and Ireland. The role of social and institutional contexts in shaping these women's parenting possibilities, choices and experiences were explored. An important finding of the study concerns cross-national differences in discourses of fatherhood and parenting. Swedish women were far more likely to choose an involved donor than Irish women. The differing possibilities and strategies available to lesbian women illustrate wider assumptions about gender and 'the family'. An examination of the significance of the genetic 'tie' found that heteronormative constructions of biology were both displaced and retained in families with co-parents. The lack of legal recognition of co-parents amounted to a difference in social validation as a parent that was negotiated in diverse ways. The study also explored the concept of gender flexibility among lesbian parents. Participants in this research demonstrated a relative absence of dichotomous gender roles, resulting in a division of labour largely characterised by equality between partners. The reinscription of discourses of gender and kinship by lesbian parents highlights the centrality of symbols such as biology, at the same time that lesbian parents may reconstruct such discourses, creating points of rupture in heteronormative relations. Finally, the study reveals the heteronormative assumptions of the Swedish and Irish welfare states, which lead to these families' efforts to resist socially exclusionary practices in contexts where they are perceived as outside the norm.

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In this thesis, I explore the construction of lesbian and gay parenting in psychology (Part 1), in the media (Part 2), and in lesbian and gay parents' talk (Part 3). My research brings together a diverse range of influences and ideas from lesbian and gay psychology, feminist psychology, and constructionist and discursive research. I draw on varied data sources: the psychological and lesbian feminist literature on lesbian (and gay) parenting, television talk shows, documentaries and newspaper articles, and research interviews with lesbian and gay parents. These data are analysed within a feminist constructionist framework, using discourse analysis. The thesis is divided into three parts. In Part 1.1 present my analysis of the psychological and lesbian feminist literature on lesbian (and gay) parenting. In this part of the thesis, I treat the literature as data and explore what it reveals about the social construction of lesbian and gay parenting. First, I provide a historical overview of the literature on lesbians and parenting over the last one hundred years. Then, I focus in detail on how discourses of sameness and difference and discourses of science inform the construction of lesbian (and gay) parenting in the literature. In Part 2, I analyse media constructions of lesbian and gay parenting. First, I identify arguments against lesbian and gay parenting in talk shows and in newspaper articles. Second, I focus specifically on talk show debates and analyse how these debates are constructed and identify the key themes informing pro-lesbian/gay parenting discourse on talk shows. In Part 3, I focus in detail on lesbian and gay parents' talk about two issues that significantly inform psychological and media debates about their fitness to parent: homophobic bullying and male role models. I explore how lesbian and gay parents engage with anti-lesbian/gay claims about homophobic bullying and male role models, and the ways in which they construct bullying and role models in the process of discursively managing their identity as 'bad' parents. In the final chapter, I discuss the contributions and implications of my research, and indicate some future developments for research on lesbian and gay parenting and for lesbian and gay psychology.

In this thesis, I explore lesbian and gay awareness training from a critical perspective. Lesbian and gay awareness training represents one of the few contemporary interventions attempting to effect positive social change on behalf of lesbians and gay men, and my researcha ssessesw hether and how this social phenomenonw orks. My researchb rings together a diverse range of ideas from critical psychology, lesbian and gay psychology and feminist psychology, using a (predominantly qualitative) multi-method approach with an emphasis on the process of training in action. I draw on a range of data source S, namely: tape-recordings of 'live' training sessions; interviews with trainers and trainees; field notes; pre-and post- training homophobia scales; and post-training evaluation forms. These data are analysed using descriptive statistics (Chapter 3), thematic analysis (Chapters 3,4,5,8), (thematic) discourse analysis (Chapters 6 and 7), and conversation analysis (Chapter 9). In seven empirical chapters I analyse various aspects of training. In Chapter 3,1 demonstrate that training 'works' when evaluated using outcome measures, and I critique the liberal ideology embodied in homophobia scales. I focus on training exercises, in Chapter 4, and I show how training is couched within a broad liberal framework. I examine pitfalls in training and how to overcome them from the trainers' perspective, in Chapter 5. Chapter 6, presents a discursive analysis of how trainees talk about their behaviour and attitude 'change' following training, and Chapter 7 analyses ways that mundane heterosexism is manifest in training. Chapters 8 and 9 analyse questions from the floor and highlight how the 'real' event differs from training manual advice. In the final chapter, I discuss the contributions and implications of my research for social change and indicate some future developments for research on lesbian and gay awarenesstr aining, and for lesbian and gay psychology.