I interviewed 60 rural, white, straight-identified men who have sex with men (MSM). I did so to answer three main research questions: How do rural, white, straight MSM understand their gender and sexual identity? How do their experiences with sexual flexibility relate to the ways in which they understand their gender and sexual identity? How do whiteness and rurality shape how they understand their gender and sexual identity? While participants shared a diversity of experiences, all aligned themselves with straight culture. Participants had varying levels of attractions to women and different sexual histories, but all identified as straight. Sexual identities are not simply descriptors for sexual orientation. They also indicate feelings of belonging in certain communities and cultures, and not belonging in others. My research shows that rural straight MSM are not closeted gay or bisexual men. They are straight men who occasionally enjoy sex with other men. Their narratives, I argue, highlight the difference between sexual orientation, sexual identity, and sexual culture. The ways participants had sex with other men—what I call bud-sex—both reinforced and reflected their alignment with straight culture. Enjoyment of straight culture, I argue, is the main reason the men I interviewed in this study identified as straight. None of them considered sex with men an important aspect of their identity. “Straight” was an identity that encompassed participants’ alignment with mainstream heterosexual institutions, such as marriage, and straight communities, to which they and most people they knew belonged. Collectively, these institutions and communities comprise straight culture. Participants considered straightness an identity, a way of life, and/or a community. Having sex with men was largely irrelevant to their sexual identity and how they understood their masculinity. Talking to them highlights how straightness is cultivated in a variety of institutions and contexts, and in numerous ways. Because participants grew up in and/or lived in white-majority rural areas, the rural straight culture to which they felt connected was by definition white. Their enjoyment of straight culture—and the institutions, communities, and ways of life attached to it—was central to their identification as straight and masculine. / 2021-01-11

The Swiss author Annemarie Schwarzenbach created literary figures that resist being classified according to a gender binary and heterosexual norm. She thereby, already in the 1930s, imagined something akin to the recent investigative work by Lisa Diamond on gender and sexual fluidity. Schwarzenbach's texts are populated by feminine men and masculine women, a genderswitching that can be interpreted as breaking apart the categories of gender and sexuality. In her novel Flucht nach oben (1933), in which the dichotomy of male and female is proven invalid, gender role models become obsolete, leading to the protagonist's deep uncertainty about his identity. Schwarzenbach’s characters can thus be called “multi–sexual” as they meld both genders as well as homo– and hetero–sexual orientations, thereby exceeding culturally fixed borders. The dichotomy between male and female becomes ever more instable, just as the labels hetero–, homo– and bisexual fall apart. In the end of the novel, the main protagonist forms a queer family together with other characters who do not fit into cultural gender norms. In contrast to earlier studies which interpret Schwarzenbach's texts biographically, I seek to use Diamond’s contemporary model indebted to queer studies. I involve, moreover, theories by Joan Rivière, René Girard, Eve Sedgwick, and Judith Butler. In addition, Flucht nach oben is read alongside Schwarzenbach's other novels – Freunde um Bernhard (1931), Lyrische Novelle (1933) and Eine Frau zu sehen (1929). These works serve as intertexts that contribute to a deeper understanding of the recurring character types and constellations of relationships in Schwarzenbach’s oeuvre.

The Swiss author Annemarie Schwarzenbach created literary figures that resist being classified according to a gender binary and heterosexual norm. She thereby, already in the 1930s, imagined something akin to the recent investigative work by Lisa Diamond on gender and sexual fluidity. Schwarzenbach's texts are populated by feminine men and masculine women, a genderswitching that can be interpreted as breaking apart the categories of gender and sexuality. In her novel Flucht nach oben (1933), in which the dichotomy of male and female is proven invalid, gender role models become obsolete, leading to the protagonist's deep uncertainty about his identity. Schwarzenbach’s characters can thus be called “multi–sexual” as they meld both genders as well as homo– and hetero–sexual orientations, thereby exceeding culturally fixed borders. The dichotomy between male and female becomes ever more instable, just as the labels hetero–, homo– and bisexual fall apart. In the end of the novel, the main protagonist forms a queer family together with other characters who do not fit into cultural gender norms. In contrast to earlier studies which interpret Schwarzenbach's texts biographically, I seek to use Diamond’s contemporary model indebted to queer studies. I involve, moreover, theories by Joan Rivière, René Girard, Eve Sedgwick, and Judith Butler. In addition, Flucht nach oben is read alongside Schwarzenbach's other novels – Freunde um Bernhard (1931), Lyrische Novelle (1933) and Eine Frau zu sehen (1929). These works serve as intertexts that contribute to a deeper understanding of the recurring character types and constellations of relationships in Schwarzenbach’s oeuvre.

This study was designed to further understand passionate friendships in a sample of heterosexual and lesbian, bisexual, and questioning (LBQ) women. Previous research has established that LBQ women engage in same-sex passionate friendships (unusually intense friendships that are similar to romantic relationships but devoid of sexual intimacy), but no systematic classification system has been established to identify these relationships in a general sample of women. A new quantitative measure, the Passionate Friendship Survey, was developed to measure passionate friendship experiences in women across adolescence and young adulthood. Qualitative interviews were also conducted to understand the subjective experience of passionate friendships in heterosexual and LBQ women.

This study explores the identity development and psychological adjustment of bisexual individuals (n = 138) as compared to homosexual (n = 45) and heterosexual participants (n = 558). Undergraduate students recruited from psychology classes at a large metropolitan university in Florida (67% female, 65% Caucasian) took an online survey for course extra credit. Bisexual and homosexual participants scored higher in identity exploration than the heterosexual participants. Bisexual participants scored significantly higher in psychological symptom severity than heterosexual participants. The three groups were not significantly different in identity commitment nor in identity distress. Female bisexual participants scored more similar to the homosexual participants in identity exploration, while the male bisexual participants were more similar to the heterosexual participants. Among males, bisexual and homosexual participants reported greater psychological symptom severity than heterosexual participants. There were no differences between groups for female participants in regard to symptom severity. This study highlights the need for more research into the psychological correlates of bisexuality as a distinct group from homosexuality, as well as the need to focus on gender as a significant moderator of these relationships.

In this research I examine the complexity of male sexuality and masculinity among male sex workers in New Orleans. Despite danger to their health and social standing, men engage in risky sexual behavior with other men for both business and pleasure. These behaviors may stem from the thrill of risk itself, or from other causes such as unexplored sexual inhibitions on the part of the male sex workers or their clients. Focusing on male sex workers, this ethnographic study explores why male sex workers engage in work that is high risk and potentially very dangerous. It examines the world of male sex work as one of the few places where men who adopt homosexual identity and those who refuse it are in intimate contact with one another. It offers us the opportunity to address questions about male sexual identity and homosexual desire, while attempting to understand the commodified spatial practices of a sexual culture in New Orleans.

Due to social stigma, millions of sexual minorities have concealed their true sexual identities by entering into heterosexual relationships and marriages. Eventually, some transition to same-sex relationships and are able to live authentic lives. This latter group had identified as genuinely heterosexual, never questioning their sexuality until a particular time in their lives when same-sex desires spontaneously appeared. The experiences of transitioning from heterosexual to same-sex partners are not well known, particularly for women who have been legally married to both men and women. Diamond's dynamical systems theory for same-sex sexuality and McCarn and Fassinger's lesbian identity formation model provided the theoretical framework for this qualitative narrative study investigating the life stories of 15 female participants recruited from social media, who had experienced a transition from heterosexual marriage to same-sex marriage. Face-to-face interviews were conducted and data were coded and analyzed to identify emergent categories. The findings revealed that the women experienced shifts in private and public sexual identities over time. Despite external obstacles and personal concerns in transitioning from heterosexual to same-sex relationships, all the women had more positive experiences in their same-sex marriages than they did in their heterosexual marriages. Understanding these women's life stories will allow mental health professionals to better understand and address the needs of this population in more clinical and applied settings. This study will also help educate the general public about women who experience shifts in the desired gender of their relationship.

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