<p> The image of Eve leaning toward the serpent and reaching for the forbidden fruit lives at the heart of the predominant creation myth of the Western world and still reverberates in its psyche. At the same time, a singular and literal interpretation of Eve has dominated cultural discourse and psychological life: Eve is understood as the one who brought death and depravity to humanity and is cast as Everywoman. The Eden story has been implicated in the patriarchal narrative regarding the inferiority of women&mdash;if every woman is Eve, then <i>Woman</i> holds the fall of humanity from divine grace in her guilty hands&mdash;as well as in narratives contributing to racism and environmental degradation. This hermeneutic inquiry asserts this interpretation and these implications are highly questionable and deeply problematic, then reconsiders Eve and her transgression in cultural-historical, mythological, and archetypal contexts&mdash;seeking to deliteralize and recover the complexity of this figure. Close attention to these contexts reveals Eve to be a mythic figure deeply linked to Goddess traditions during a great mythological shift as Goddess mythologies were being supplanted by Sky Father mythologies, and an exemplar of a larger mythic motif of feminine transgression. The resulting depth psychological reading of Eve&rsquo;s transgression shows Eve as a particular style of consciousness, demonstrating specific archetypal dynamics, characteristics, and ways of knowing.</p><p>

<p> The literature on leaving fundamentalist religious traditions is persistently insensitive to gender differences, specifically the experiences of women who have left a fundamentalist religion (Peek, Lowe, &amp; Williams, 1991). Recently, women have begun sharing their personal experiences of apostasy through memoirs, blogs, and social media (Cross, 2006; Drain &amp; Pulitzer, 2013; Jessop &amp; Palmer, 2008). Utilizing Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (Smith, Flowers, &amp; Larkin, 2009), this dissertation illuminates the lived experience of women who left a Protestant fundamentalist religion. The findings reflect the participants&rsquo; experiences in four dimensions of life: the psychological consequences of leaving fundamentalism, the identity consequences of leaving fundamentalism, the gendered consequences of leaving fundamentalism, and the relational consequences of leaving fundamentalism. The psychological findings highlight an often painful and traumatizing experience of leaving fundamentalism. The identity findings indicate that fundamentalism impedes identity development and that individuals have the freedom to explore their own identity subsequent to leaving. In particular, the gendered findings point at internalized oppression women carry related to being raised in fundamentalism as well as a sense of empowerment many discover after leaving. Finally, the relational findings emphasize often long-standing interpersonal challenges women face after leaving fundamentalism, while also finding community and support outside, which proves immensely healing. The results from this study articulate the deeply meaningful experience of leaving Protestant fundamentalism for women, and provide insight into the clinical implications for treatment of the effects of leaving fundamentalism on women.</p>

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Syracuse University, 2009. / "Publication number:AAT 3381568."

<p> There is little research into the effect religion may have on the gender assignment of intersex persons. This research addresses that issue, exploring the possible roots of contemporary gender assignment practices in ancient notions of purity and pollution, or purity rules, and argues that such customs or norms influence contemporary perspectives and attitudes surrounding gender identity. This work examines the practice of gender assignment of intersex persons in the &ldquo;Western&rdquo; world, along with any and all associated medical procedures and the teaching of gender performance and the adoption of gender performance by the subjects, and suggests that the practice of gender assignment is, in fact, a ritual practice stemming from western notions of purity and pollution surrounding the body, specifically, gender as it relates to the body. Finally, this work concludes that the &ldquo;Western&rdquo; notion of purity and pollution which frame the ritual practice of gender assignment, have failed to evolve despite advances in science, psychology and social ethics and thus, this ritual practice needs to be seriously reexamined.</p>

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a multifaceted social issue that affects the Christian faith community as it does the secular community. Though the literature reflects some understanding of general correlates and possible antecedents to IPV within the Christian community, the impact of religious and spiritual factors tends to be homogenized and is often misjudged. Allport's theory of intrinsic and extrinsic religious orientation provided a platform for investigating Christian male-perpetrated IPV. This quantitative study utilized survey design and measured the impact of 10 select religious and spiritual factors on the probability of physical or sexual IPV perpetration. Archival data from Wave III of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health were used and included male participants ages 18 to 26 who nominally classified themselves as Catholic, Protestant, or Christian. Data were analyzed using binary logistic regression and results indicated that IPV perpetration could not be predicted from the 10 religious or spiritual factors. Given the geographic breadth and the size of the sample utilized, not finding a predictive model suggests there may be a lack of consistency in religious and spiritual orientation in these young males and elucidated analysis problems resulting from multicollinearity and the use of ordinal data. Though a predictive model for Christian male-perpetrated IPV was not found, the results of this study can contribute to social change by challenging existing ecclesiastical paradigms regarding which religious or spiritual factors, if any, impact Christian male-perpetrated IPV and which religious and spiritual factors should be addressed in faith-based batterers' programs targeting young adult males.