In a moment when visibility and representations of LGBTTQAI+ people are proliferating in North American society, it is important to think critically about how visibility and representations function and to interrogate their meanings and a/effects. This thesis uses data produced from five semi-structured interviews conducted with lesbian identified participants living in non-urban spaces in Ontario to demonstrate the importance of a continued lesbian specificity, to draw attention to heteronormativity and heterosexism in Ontarian society, to challenge femme invisibility and complicate the notion of femme privilege, and to move beyond the urban/rural binary as a way of making sense of sexuality. The methodological framework guiding this thesis draws on interpretive phenomenological analysis as well as feminist and queer methodologies, which facilitated a responsive and reflexive research process. This thesis is grounded in ongoing debates around identity politics and representation, drawing on literature from lesbian theories, lesbian-feminist histories, queer theories, heterosexism, heteronormativity and homonormativity, lesbian-feminist histories, white privilege studies, queer and feminist geography, and LGBTTQAI+ rural studies.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:uottawa.ca/oai:ruor.uottawa.ca:10393/34283 |
| Date | January 2016 |
| Creators | Prest, Dayna |
| Contributors | Magnet, Shoshana |
| Publisher | Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa |
| Source Sets | Université d’Ottawa |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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